Top Congress leaders, led by Sonia Gandhi, started a brainstorming session on Monday on the possible reasons for the party’s defeat in the recent Assembly polls at a meeting of the Congress Working Committee (CWC). Chairing the meeting, Congress president Gandhi expressed concern over a possible third wave of COVID-19 and accused the Narendra Modi government of having completely abdicated its duty and leaving the responsibility of vaccinating people against the viral disease to the states. “CWC meeting begins. Smt Sonia Gandhi expresses concern about a possible third Covid wave and says that the Modi Government has abdicated its responsibility and left vaccination to States,” Congress’s chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala wrote on Twitter. “She says it would have been financially more equitable for the Centre to provide a free vaccine to all,” he said. The CWC meet was convened to assess the party’s losses in the recently-concluded Assembly polls in four states and a Union Territory, amid demands from its leaders for a serious introspection over its poor performance at the hustings. The polls were held in West Bengal, Assam, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and the Union Territory of Puducherry. The Congress has lost most of the elections since the 2019 Lok Sabha polls and though it has managed to win in Tamil Nadu, it was with the support of its bigger ally and regional player Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK).
The grand old party lost the Arunachal Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Odisha and Haryana elections in 2019 and the Delhi and Bihar polls last year. It only won in Jharkhand along with its ally Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM). In the recently-concluded Assembly polls, the party failed to wrest back power in Kerala and Assam and drew a blank in West Bengal. It also lost out in Puducherry. The deliberations would help the Congress prepare for the next round of Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur. Chairing a meeting of the Congress Parliamentary Party, Gandhi had earlier said the party’s performance in the recently-concluded Assembly polls was very disappointing and the party MPs must draw appropriate lessons from this setback in the spirit of humility and honesty. “Most unfortunately, our own performance in all the states was very disappointing and if I may say, unexpectedly so,” she had said.
