The growing conflict within the Congress came to the fore when former state president, Rita Bahuguna Joshi, claimed that only workers had supported her during last Parliament elections.
``I only had high praises for my party workers who had supported me whole heartedly during last Parliament elections but I can now say that the Congress leaders had not forwarded any help to her otherwise the scenario would be different”, cited Rita Bahuguna Joshi, while lamenting reasons for her defeat in the last Parliament elections. She was addressing the local leaders who collected here at Congress state head-quarter to discuss the reasons for defeat of Party candidates in lucknow City and Rural (Mohanlalganj reserved Parliament constituency), on Thursday.
Though Rita not named anyone but she was reportedly targeting state president Nirmal Khatri and his team who have not given any support to her. It may be also mentioned that Khatri, despite of state president had not participated in the procession when Rita went to file her nomination papers in this Parliament elections. Sources said that this move of Khatri had sent a strong signal amongst the party leaders so they kept a safe distance from Rita during the entire election campaign.
Interestingly, during review of the Mohanlalganj Parliament constituency, the Party’s candidate Narendra Gautam, not even turned up at the Congress head-quarter to discuss the reasons with other leaders. Sources in the Party confirmed that he remained away from the meeting as almost all the leaders in one voice alleged that how the Party candidate siphoned off the entire fund given by the All India Congress Committee for campaigning, and had not spent a single penny out of it. ``I toured and campaigned with Gautam (Comgress candidate) in the villages till late evening in this hot summer but the candidate, who received huge sum from the AICC for campaign, had not even arranged a glass of water, leave other facilities for us”, shouted a senior women Congress leader who seems to be very annoyed in the manner in which the workers were treated during the election campaign. The other workers in one voice also supported her after which the AICC secretary, Zubair Ahmed, who was heading the discussion had to appeal to give some more reasons for the Party’s defeat.
Meanwhile calling for a high-level inquiry into the revelations made in the CAG report on the Mahakumbh held in Allahabad last year, the Congress demanded stern
action against those found responsible for the mismanagement. “The manner in which central funds for the Mahakumbh were spent on things other than mela management is most shameful. A high-level inquiry needs to be ordered into the irregularities
and stern action should be taken against those responsible for it,” demanded RP Singh, the spokesman of the Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee. “It is not just that the state government did not use central funds meant for organising the mela and instead kept
it in its pocket and has also been patting its back claiming credit for the mega show,” Singh said. Because of the mismanagement, the stampede at the railway station claimed several lives and the CAG report clearly states that state government was responsible for it, he said. Congress spokesman further said that the state had been befooling everyone by claiming that the central government was not giving adequate funds for the Kumbh but now the reality is out before the people.