Congress faces allies’ flak after Haryana shock, Uddhav Sena talks of ‘ground realities’ for Maharashtra seat talks

Samajwadi Party MP and spokesperson Rajeev Rai told The Indian Express that the Congress has to come out of its thinking that it is the leader of the alliance. “The Congress didn’t give us any seat in the Haryana election with (Bhupinder Singh) Hooda ji saying that our party doesn’t have a standing in the state. The same thing happened in Madhya Pradesh before the Lok Sabha polls when Shivraj Singh Chouhan had asked who is Akhilesh Yadav. The Congress comes and asks us for seats where they have no standing, but don’t want to share seats in the states where they are strong. They have to realise that an alliance has to run on mutual respect, and that should be followed in the future,” said Rai.

TMC Rajya Sabha member Sagarika Ghose said the regional parties in the INDIA bloc are the main forces in the alliance. “You can see the Lok Sabha results. Where the INDIA bloc performed well were states where the Congress had an alliance with regional parties. It is the regional parties who are taking the BJP head on, and defeating it. The Congress needs to realise this, and accommodate its allies better in the coming elections,” said Ghose.

Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) spokesperson Saravanan Annadurai said that the Congress should learn a lesson from their defeat in Haryana. “This should help them understand how to handle Maharashtra elections. The Congress and the allies in Maharashtra should stay united and defeat the BJP,” said Annadurai.

CPI’s D Raja said that seat sharing in the INDIA bloc is not being “done in a proper way”. “The INDIA bloc parties must introspect… The Congress has to be self critical on seat-sharing. There has to be mutual trust,” said Raja.

The RJD, however, took a different line, with its spokesperson Subodh Kumar Mehta saying that the party expected a better result in Haryana for the Congress. “The way Rahul Gandhi campaigned and the issues the party took to the people, we definitely expected better results. But we have to accept the feelings on which the voters have voted. There will be time for introspection and I am sure it will be done. But somewhere it appears the independent candidates have had an impact,” said Mehta.

Aam Aadmi Party MP Sanjay Singh said the Congress didn’t take along its allies in Haryana.

“Who was going to be the CM in Haryana? someone from the Congress. Who was going to form the government? Congress. Who had good chances there? Congress. What was AAP saying? Please reach a settlement with us and we can together defeat the BJP. The Samajwadi Party also made efforts. They didn’t take either the SP or AAP along. The Congress should do an assessment,” said Singh.

Talking of the Lok Sabha elections in UP, Singh said: “The SP gave Congress 17 seats when it had just two MLAs in the state. We gave unconditional support to the alliance in UP. In Maharashtra, Arvind Kejriwal campaigned despite us not contesting any seats.”

“If Kejriwal ji and Akhilesh Yadav ji had campaigned in Haryana, it would have benefitted the Congress,” said Singh.

– Inputs from Deeptiman Tiwary and Nikhila Henry