THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Senior Congress MP Benny Behanan, who has been functioning as party observer for the Meghalaya election on February 27, has his task cut out. The Meghalaya Congress party is going to the polls without a single party MLA as 21 of its legislators defected to Trinamool Congress and National People’s Party in the last one year.
Usually, senior leaders like Ramesh Chennithala are deputed as senior party observers in northeastern state polls. However this time around, Benny was chosen. With 75 % of the voters being Christians, the central Congress leadership zeroed in on a Christian leader like Benny Behanan as one of the observers in Meghalaya.
Benny Behanan along with chief observer Mukul Wasnik and another observer Jesudasu Seelam, former Rajya Sabha MP from Andhra Pradesh, had a tough time finding party candidates for the 60 seats going to elections.
"Even though Congress legislators had defected to the TMC and NPP, the party rank and file is still intact. The Congress base is still active. We need to give them the confidence that all is not lost," Benny Behanan told The New Indian Express.
With BJP and TMC on a massive mission to defect leaders, the Congress leadership had been unable to put an end to outflow from the party, as the money involved in horse trading is something which the party cannot afford.
The current role of the observer post of Benny Behanan is recognition of his stellar performance in Lok Sabha. Of late, he had been alienated from the Oommen Chandy camp after he stepped down from the role of UDF convener. But their rapport is intact as it was Benny Behanan who accompanied Oommen Chandy to Germany when the latter went there for expert medical treatment of his throat problem.