Sultanpur loss shocks Cong

Even so,Congress candidate Jagdish Singh polled a mere 93 votes of the 2,719 and trailed the BSP,SP and an Independent candidate. This,when the party claims to be concentrating on Rahul Gandhi’s mission to form a Congress Government in the state by 2012.

Sources in the constituency say apart from facing pressures from the ruling party,Jagdish Singh had to contend with a lot of in-fighting: a section of partymen were supporting SP candidate Shailendra Singh,who came second. Local workers of the party say Singh had accepted his defeat long before polling and had stopped campaigning for himself. “I do not remember,if in a long time Congress has polled so few votes on this seat in the Legislative Council election,” said Maksood Ahmad,district Congress chief,Sultanpur.

“While we came second on this seat,we always managed over 500 votes. Even last time,we had got around 1,000. All I can say is that there was no stone left unturned at least from the district organisation.”

The state party president,Rita Bahuguna Joshi,refused to speak on the loss in Sultanpur. “We are trying to look at the larger picture,” she said.

“While we have won the Rae Bareli seat,we had already expressed our fear about rigging and the use of government machinery to the election commission on all seats. Thus,we were not surprised to see that we lost closely on seats like Bahraich,Basti and Deoria.”

The party,she said,will be filing a fresh petition against the “rigging”. “We will try to analyse the reasons of loss on each seat and only then be able to comment on it,” she added.

Sources say the party has already approached Singh and has asked him to inform about the problems he faced in this election. Local partymen say a large section of Congressmen wanted a ticket for Jagannath,the Independent candidate,who has come third. But parliamentarian Sanjay Singh recommended Jagdish Singh,a “jila panchayat adhyaksha” in Sultanpur.

“We had recommended Jagannath’s name because he belongs to a backward class and it would have been easier to get votes for him since other two candidates belonged to upper class,” said a local Congress leader.

Of the 21 seats it contested,the party won just one — Rae Bareli. Before the polls,it had one seat — Muzaffarnagar-Saharanpur,which it lost by a huge margin. It has come second on four seats — Khiri,Behraich,Basti and Deoria.

BSP set to get Council chairman’s post
The term of present chairman of the UP Legislative Council,Choudhari Sukram Singh Yadav,who belongs to the Samajwadi Party,ends on January 15. He has not contested the Council polls this time. With the BSP getting a simple majority in the Upper House,it can get its candidate elected as the new chairman. The session of both the Houses of the state legislature is scheduled to commence on January 21.