The good news for the Congress in Madhya Pradesh is that it could not get worse. The Congress rank and file has completely been demolished in Madhya Pradesh in the lok Sabha elections.
The party could win only two seats — Chhindwara and Guna — contested by Union Ministers Kamal Nath and Jyotiraditya Scindia,respectively.
With weak leadership at New Delhi, Congress leaders in the State feel there are bleak prospects of the party's revival in Madhya Pradesh in the coming days. There is widespread fear in Bhopal's PCC office, Indira Bhavan, that Congress' exit from the Centre could extend the party's exile from power in the Madhya Pradesh.
After the formation of Shivraj Singh Chouhan Government with a thumping majority in November 2013, the BJP leaders had been stressing for long that the Congress would be finished in Madhya Pradesh. However, nobody in the BJP or Congress believed this, but the results of the lok Sabha elections declared on Friday were evidence in this direction.
Even the surveys conducted by the BJP and other agencies were of the opinion that the Congress would win at least three seats. But the results show that this is the worst performance by the Congress party this time. In the last elections, the Congress was in possession of 12 seats out of 29.In the Narendra Modi wave, Congress' present president Arun Yadav and former president Kantilal Bhuria lost the elections. Bhuria had suspected this situation and thus he had voluntarily asked the high command to change the PCC chief in the State. On this, Bhuria was replaced by Arun Yadav on January 20, 2014.
However, the candidates the BJP had fielded against Kamal Nath and Scindia were strong enough but they could not register their victories. Initially, Choudhary Chandrabhan Singh maintained lead against Nath, but once the Union Minister started leading, he stopped only with victory.
When the issue was raised before Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, as why the BJP gave walkover in Chhindwara and Guna seats, Chouhan replied, "It may be due to the fact that the Congress MPs there have done some work. There might be the reason that there were some shortcomings on the part of party workers. We would try to find out the reasons."