Congress in crisis as resignations pile up

In the wake of electoral debacle, the Congress appeared to be in a crisis on Monday with resignations of its leaders piling up and the leadership planning to crack the whip.

Amid the shock in the party, Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Monday met party treasurer Ahmed Patel and general secretary K. C. Venugopal.

Patel sought to scotch speculation that they had gone to meet Gandhi in the context of Congress Working Committee meeting which rejected his offer to resign.

He said meeting with Gandhi was for routine administrative work.

"I had sought time before the CWC to meet the Congress President to discuss routine administrative work. The meeting today was in that context. All other speculation is incorrect and baseless," Patel said in a tweet.

Meanwhile, three more state party chiefs have tendered their resignations, taking the total number to six.

Congress party chiefs of Jharkhand, Assam and Punjab have also resigned in addition to those from Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Odisha. Karanataka Pradesh Campaign Committee chairman H. K. Patil has also resigned.

Punjab Congress chief Sunil Jhakar, who was the sitting MP from Gurdaspur, sent his resignation to Congress President Rahul Gandhi taking moral responsibility for losing to actor Sunny Deol from the seat. The Congress has generally done well in Punjab winning eight of 13 seats.

Jharkhand Congress chief Ajoy Kumar has also tendered his resignation. The party won only one seat in the state where it had an alliance with the JMM, RJD and other parties.

While the party won Singhbhum seat, it lost Khunti by only 1,445 votes and Lohardaga by 10,363 votes.

The party's Assam unit chief Ripun Bora also wrote to Gandhi taking moral responsibility for the party not being able to increase its tally from its previous tally of three seats. He has said in his letter that Gandhi may choose to replace him.

Maharashtra unit chief Ashok Chavan, Uttar Pradesh unit chief Raj Babbar, and Odisha Congress chief Niranjan Patnaik have already sent their resignations.

Yogendra Misra, the district Congress chief in Amethi in Uttar Pradesh has also sent his resignation, owning moral responsibility for Rahul Gandhi's defeat from Amethi.

Gandhi had also offered to resign taking moral responsibility for the party's defeat but the Congress Working Committee unanimously rejected the offer.

--IANS

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