Congress in its yearning for votes, rolled out a ‘contest’ for the party leaders in Mandsaur and surrounding districts aspiring for tickets in the coming assembly polls.
The avowed intent of the Congress came across loud and clear when ahead of Rahul Gandhi’s rally which is to be held in Pipliamandi on 6th June, AICC secretary and MP in-charge Sanjay Kapoor announced before a crowd of party leaders from Mandsaur, Ratlam, Neemuch, and Ujjain on Thursday that ticket to contest the assembly poll would be given to only those leaders who bring a larger crowd to the rally. He said, “Show your might. Let those who got more people to Rahulji’s rally get tickets; those who fail to do so will understand why they did not.” Kapoor dubbed the rally as the “launch of Congress’ election campaign”.
The leaders had assembled to strategize a plan to marshal the farmers to the rally on 6th June to pay tribute to those farmers who were killed in police firing last year.
Sanjay Kapoor went on to say that all the ticket aspirants should carry their crowd under a banner or poster made by them in order to exhibit their work, which would be recorded by observers.
The Congress meeting in Pipliamandi saw party leaders of various factions come under one umbrella resonating Congress’ intentions to project Mandsaur as the epicentre for its election campaign.
This kind of internal altercations and struggle manifesting in the form of intense haggling over finalizing the party tickets are not new in the Congress party. Congress was seen struggling at the highest level with the list of candidates during Karnataka elections as well.
Ticket distribution has somehow always been Congress’ Achilles heel. Earlier, this year Congress in poll-bound Meghalaya suffered a setback after 115 members of the party from two constituencies of the state resigned over-allotment of election tickets. Similarly in 2017, during Himachal Pradesh elections, the Congress worried over rebellion inside the party over the distribution of tickets, especially in Shimla (Urban) and districts like Mandi and Kullu, had set-up a three-member committee to resolve the issue.
Congress president Rahul Gandhi perhaps knows for a fact, that ticket distribution as always turned out to be a real can of worms for the party. This is why probably the party this time is adopting this ludicrous idea for ticket distribution and as is the nature of Congress party, the merit of candidates hold no importance as long as the dynasty is being served.
This move by Madhya Pradesh Congress is telling of how the party believes in serving the dynasty ahead of anything else. It was reported earlier how West Bengal Congress swear by Gandhis first before even the constitution and they were made to sign loyalty affidavits. and how recently an FIR was filed against a harmless spoof video of Rahul Gandhi because ‘it insulted the Gandhis’.
