Congress got active support from BSP, CPI: Amarinder

PATIALA, March 4: The losing Congress candidate for the Patiala parliamentary constituency, Captain Amrinder Singh has refuted all claims th...

PATIALA, March 4: The losing Congress candidate for the Patiala parliamentary constituency, Captain Amrinder Singh has refuted all claims that Congress was not actively supported by the BSP and CPI workers in the constituency. Thanking the people of the constituency for supporting him, Amrinder said that he lost only on the account that the honeymoon of the SAD-BJP government with the masses is yet to be over. “Had the election been held some months later, the results would have been different,” he said.

Replying to a query on who was responsible for the Congress debacle in the state, Amrinder said,“we should not not be making scape goats. These things are yet to be analysed.” He said that going by the polling patterns, since the Patiala contest was being viewed as a fight between Gurcharan Singh Tohra and himself, it is a moral defeat for Tohra.

He pointed out that in the segments falling in the Patiala district, the Congress led and if one analyses the polling pattern, the number of votes polled by the party have increased. He also alleged that though the civil administration and the top level police functionaries were fair, some of the lower rung police personnel openly supported his opponents.

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Talking to media persons, both Amrinder and another senior Congressman Bir Devinder, said that going by the political scenario at the Centre, the next elections are not very far off. He promised to gear up the Patiala cadre and strengthen the party functioning at the grass root level. He also predicted that the party will surely fare well in the forthcoming Corporation and Panchayat elections.

Singh also said that although the Congress has lost these election, the party workers will not tolerate any vendetta from the Akalis. He said that with the SAD getting absolute majority from the state, the economic scenario in the state is bound to worsen and there are chances that militancy might re-surface. He said that the Congress will take up these issues at the Centre.