BHOPAL: Infighting has erupted in the opposition Congress in northern Madhya Pradesh’s Datia district, a day after polling for the Datia assembly by-election.
A war of words has broken out between Congress candidate Kunwar Ghanshyam Singh and the party’s disqualified MLA Rajendra Bharti.
Singh, a member of Datia’s erstwhile royal family, on Friday accused Bharti, the 2023 winner and a three-time former Congress MLA, of sabotaging the party’s prospects in Thursday’s by-election.
He alleged that Bharti and his supporters had worked covertly for the BJP candidate after receiving funding from the ruling party. “I’ve already brought it to the notice of the party’s top brass, including the state Congress president, party’s national leadership, including the party’s in-charge for Madhya Pradesh, Harish Chaudhary. I’ve demanded Bharti’s expulsion from the party for working against the party in the by-election.”
Singh, who opened a front against Bharti a day after the latter had said that Singh was batting on a strong pitch created by him, claimed that the alleged sabotage by Bharti and his supporters would affect only around 2,000 votes. “The Congress will still win the poll with a big margin and I will be the next MLA from Datia seat,” Singh said confidently on Friday.
Responding to the allegations, Bharti described the Congress candidate as cowardly and timid, and alleged that it was former BJP MLA Narottam Mishra who had actually fought Singh’s election. “He (Singh) fought the election with Mishra's support. During the course of electioneering, Singh praised Mishra from the stage, despite knowing well that it was Mishra only, at whose behest Congress workers in Datia were harassed for years.”
“Mishra made all arrangements for Singh, it was Mishra’s people only who were handling Singh’s fund management. Ghanshyam Singh didn’t want to contest polls against Mishra, but once Mishra was denied the BJP ticket, Singh contested on Congress ticket with Mishra’s help.”
With Ghanshyam Singh and Rajendra Bharti trading charges against each other, both Ghanshyam Singh and BJP’s first-time candidate Ashutosh Tiwari appear to be facing challenges owing to possible sabotage from within their respective local party ranks.
It now remains to be seen which party suffered more sabotage from within its ranks and how well Azad Samaj Party (KR) candidate Damodar Singh Yadav fought the polls.
More than 71.41% voter turnout was recorded till 6 pm on Thursday in the by-election, around nine percentage points lower than in the 2023 assembly polls.
What could be particularly worrying for the ruling BJP, which was hoping for a higher female voter turnout, is that only 68.48% of women voted, compared with 74.09% of men.
The by-election to the northern Madhya Pradesh seat was necessitated by the disqualification of sitting Congress MLA Rajendra Bharti following his conviction in a bank cheating and fraud case.
