BHUBANESWAR: Even as senior leaders continued to target each other for the party’s worst-ever election performance in Odisha, the 20-member committee constituted to find out the reasons behind the poll drubbing started assessing the situation with the view to revive the party by 2024.
The first meeting of the 20-member committee headed by senior leader Narasingh Mishra was held on Saturday at Congress Bhavan here.
Mishra told media persons after the meeting that six sub-committees have been formed to visit different areas and find out what went wrong for the party in the Assembly elections.
Each of the sub-committees will have five districts under it. The sub-committee members will visit different constituencies, interact with people and the defeated candidates to take their opinion before submitting their reports.
Mishra said the 20-member committee will finalise its report by June-end after taking into account the reports submitted by the sub-committees. He said corrective measures will be initiated for the revival of Congress in Odisha basing on the report and discussion held at the party level.
The number of seats won by the Congress slumped to 9 in the Assembly elections compared to 14 in the 2014 elections. In the Lok Sabha polls, however, the Congress candidate Saptagiri Ulaka won from Koraput constituency, though it was defeated in all the Assembly seats in undivided Koraput district, except Jeypore.
Meanwhile, former minister Ganeswar Behera who was defeated from Kendrapara Assembly seat by former Finance Minister and BJD candidate Sashi Bhusan Behera blamed intra-party fighting as the reason behind the party’s debacle in the elections.
“We have failed to learn from the past,” he said. Out of the seven Assembly segments under Kendrapara Lok Sabha seat, Congress was defeated from two - Aul and Rajnagar which had sitting MLAs.
Senior leaders continued to target Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee president Niranjan Patnaik for poor performance at the hustings. Putting the blame on State Congress leadership for the present situation in the party, former Union Minister Kanhu Charan Lenka said there will be a major restructuring in Odisha Congress.
“There will be a Nabakalebar of Congress and the party will again come to power in 2024,” he said and added that he will apprise everything to party president Rahul Gandhi.