Congress gets down to brass tacks on poll show

​Hyderabad: The Pradesh Congress Committee, as part of its exercise to prepare for the upcoming Parliament and local body polls, has begun review of the party’s performance in recently-concluded Assembly elections. The reviews, to be held for three days, have been aimed at finding the reasons for the defeat of the party in the Assembly polls and to take measures to ensure winning maximum number of seats in the Parliament elections. 

Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee president N Uttam Kumar Reddy, State affairs in-charge RC Khuntia, working presidents Kusuma Kumar and Ponnam Prabhakar and AICC in-charge secretary Srinivasan Krishnan have participated in the first day review. They held discussions with the candidates of the Assembly polls of the party from Adilabad, Peddapalle, Nizamabad, Zaheerabad and Warangal Parliamentary constituencies. 

The PCC and AICC leaders asked the reasons for the defeat of the party in the Assembly polls and sought suggestions from them on the improvements to be made for the Parliament elections. Sources in the party said that the candidates have told the leadership that enough time was not given for campaign in their constituencies. The Assembly constituencies were big in size and it has become difficult for them to cover in the limited time. They also said that schemes of the government have attracted the voters. 

Speaking on the steps to be taken to improve party’s performance in Parliament polls, they said that the candidates should be announced at the earliest allowing them to take up campaign in the constituency. MLC Shabbir Ali said that the review has been held to find out the reasons for the defeat of the party in Assembly polls. He said that each constituency would have its own reasons. He said that the errors would be found and they would be corrected by the time of Parliament polls. 

The PCC and AICC leaders also discussed formation of district and mandal-level committees for the party. They informed the instructions being issued by the AICC on completing for the formation of party structure. According to party leaders, the AICC has told the PCC to form committees at State level like Pradesh Election Committee, Coordination Committee, Publicity Committee and Media Coordination Committee. These committees shall commence functioning from January 15. 

The PCC should complete formation of State, district and mandal-level committees by January 15. The Booth Committees should be formed by January 30. Training to the booth committees should be organised by the PCC and it should be completed by the end of February. The database of the office bearers from PCC level to Booth level should be submitted to general secretaries and the AICC by the end of February. The PCC shall take updating of voters list seriously as per the schedule issued by the Election Commission of India.