Assam : Congress cries foul over margins

way2barak, May 6: As Opposition parties in Assam took stock of their poll debacle on Tuesday, Assam Congress president Gaurav Gogoi, who himself lost the election from Jorhat, questioned the role of the Election Commission (EC), pointing to the huge margins of the BJP’s victories.

The Congress registered its worst performance in Assam, winning only 19 of the 126 Assembly seats. Of its 19 MLAs, 18 are Muslim leaders who won from seats where minority community voters make up a bulk of voters, reflecting the party’s inability to appeal to the rest of the electorate. The electoral loss suffered by Gogoi, who had made his state poll debut, was the biggest individual defeat among the party’s candidates, along with the defeat of Debabrata Saikia, who was the Leader of the Opposition in the outgoing Assembly.

While stating that the party accepts the public verdict and that he accepts moral responsibility for the defeat, Gogoi on Tuesday targeted the EC. “Our leader Rahul Gandhi has been raising questions about this election. We have seen the behaviour and character of the Election Commission. We have been saying this as various parties on the floor of the House in Delhi. We even tried to bring a no-confidence motion against the Chief Election Commissioner,” he said.