BHUBANESWAR: Even as the congress aims to regain lost ground in the panchayat elections by improving its performance, factionalism has come to the fore, threatening to pull the party further down.
The party failed to field candidates in all the six zilla parishad (ZP) zones in Satyabadi Assembly constituency as the in charge of ticket distribution Prasad Harichandan allegedly did not do so.
The party claimed that tickets had been released for all the 853 ZP zones by the president of the Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) Niranjan Patnaik. But Harichandan did not distribute them till the last minute despite reminders from the party aspirants and leadership.
The former minister was, however, not available to place his side of the story despite repeated attempts. But sources in the OPCC admitted that the party fielded candidates in 847 ZP zones except the six in the Satyabadi constituency.
The issue is reported to have been discussed at the meeting of the election committee of the party held on Sunday. But Harichandan did not attend the meeting.
Harichandan has kept himself away from Congress activities for the last several months though he is attending other functions in his constituency. Meanwhile, the election committee discussed campaign issues of the party.
Deteriorating the law and order situation in the State, increasing crimes against women particularly, price rise and anti-farmer policies of the State government will be raised by the party candidates during campaigning.
Besides, local issues like the alleged lathicharge of police at Dhinkia will be raised by the party in Jagatsinghpur and Kendrapara districts.
The Congress leaders noted that the party does not have the problem of rebel candidates like the BJD and has been able to field candidates in a majority of seats for, ward members, sarpanch, and panchayat Samiti members.
Party has fielded candidates in 90 per cent of seats for the sarpanch post, party spokesperson Manoranjan Das said.