Cong MLAs denied tickets in C'garh speak up against 'fake' party surveys

New Delhi : Days after the massive setback in Chhattisgarh, the Congress leaders who were denied tickets have started coming out in open alleging that fake surveys were done to deny them the party tickets for the recently held elections in the state.

The Congress lost to the BJP in the recently concluded assembly election in which Congress managed to win only 35 out of 90 seats in the state while the BJP came to power with 54 seats. The Congress was eyeing for a second consecutive term in the state.

Following the party's defeat, many of the former MLAs of the party on Friday arrived in the national capital and met Congress General Secretary (Organisation) KC Venugopal citing the survey report for denial of ticket to them in the elections.

At least 12 out of 22 former MLAs, who were denied tickets met Venugopal asking the credibility of the survey report. One of the 12 former MLAs said that they met with Venugopal and apprised him that due to such shady survey report they were denied tickets.

They said that they apprised Venugopal that by denying tickets to the sitting MLAs on the basis of the survey report, which showed them losing, had cost the party. “By denying us tickets, the Congress gave its winning seats to the BJP as a gift,” they said.

The former MLAs said that they have also sought appointment with party chief Kharge to discuss the issue of the survey report, which denied them the tickets.

Among the 12 MLAs, who came to Delhi include Brihaspati Singh, Motilal, Shisupal Sori, Vijay Jaiswal, Channing Lal, Bhuwneshwar Baghel, Chandradev Rai, Vinod, Mamta Chandrakar, Pramod Sharma, Mohit Kakreta and Laxmi Dhruv.

The former MLAs pointing out at the survey also said that the central leadership too had sent its own team to prepare the survey report.

"However, they were not allowed to conduct their surveys on the basis of the survey done at the state level, so we want to know who all were responsible for hatching conspiracy against the party," the former MLAs said.

When asked who they feel responsible for the same, they said, "The incharge, co-incharge and other leaders, who made the policies and got a fake survey done and cheated the party. So we demand action against them for conducting a fake survey, they said.

As per the party leaders, party strategist Sunil Kanugolu was asked to conduct a survey in Chhattisgarh after the reluctance of the state leadership over their own survey report, Kanugolu didn't went ahead.

Similar was the condition in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, where the state leadership decided the survey team at the state level. Kanugolu, meanwhile, who got a free hand in Telangana once again delivered the party another massive victory after Karnataka.

On Saturday, Kharge in his first decision after the losses in Madhya Pradesh replaced senior party leader and former Chief Minister Kamal Nath with Jitu Patwari as state unit chief and also appointed Umang Singhar as the CLP leader. In Chhattisgarh, Kharge appointed MLA Charan Das Mahant as the CLP Leader and asked Deepak Bain to continue as state unit chief.