Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday visited Amritsar to meet leaders and get a lowdown on the reasons behind the partys defeat in the January 30 Assembly polls and chalk out a roadmap for the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. In a freewheeling session,where leaders,most of them block presidents,were given a chance to speak at a resort on the Amritsar-Rajasansi road,Rahul was told how party had lost the plot in Punjab due to factionalism,wrong distribution of tickets,distribution of tickets to a few families and ignoring block presidents. During the meet,Rahul admitted that there were mistakes in distribution of tickets,party cadre was not taken into confidence and too many tickets were given to a few families. My job is to speak to senior leaders and submit a report to party president (Sonia Gandhi), Rahul told the gathering,including several former and current MPs and MLAs,and party leaders. Urging all those present to give him in writing what they had in mind,Rahul said he will go through these before submitting his report. Citing his meeting with wrestler Sushil Kumar,where he told Rahul that he could not win a gold in the London Olympics due to dehydration,Rahul said: Congress in Punjab too was a gold medallist party but could not win it (in January 30 Punjab polls) and the result was opposite (to the expectation). There is a need to identify the reasons and rectify those. Though none of the leaders named state party chief Amarinder Singh directly for the poll debacle,veiled attacks were made against him. One of them rued that no sincere effort was made to appease those who were upset at being denied tickets. A leader from Jalalabad said that those who were not included in the primary membership of the party,got tickets and the party leadership did not campaign in the area from where Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal contested. He went on to claim that the ticket to the Congress candidate from Jalalabad was given on the directions of Sukhbir Badal. Senior leader Malti Thapar,while lamenting that there was factionalism in the party,said: Some leaders were not faithful to the state president who had been appointed by none other than Sonia Gandhi. After a block president claimed that no one took his views while allotting tickets for Assembly polls,Rahul asked who all were asked to give their feedback on ticket allotment. Except for Patiala and Hoshiarpur,most block presidents claimed they were not consulted. Among the prominent leaders who were present during the programme were Ambika Soni,Manish Tewari,Jagmeet Brar Amarinder Singh and Sunil Jakhar. Rahul also had an interactive session with the Punjab Youth Congress leaders during a meeting at a resort on the Amritsar-Attari road.
