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Blame game ritual begins in right earnest

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It's a ritual: blame game following a defeat. And with exit polls showing certain debacle, Congress-NCP leaders are at it in earnest. And blame game is expected to gather momentum and even take a nasty turn once the results are out by Sunday afternoon.

As such, some Congress leaders have already started citing a number of reasons for the party's debacle, and are suggesting a major overhaul of the party organization as a solution to improve the party's position in the state.
A section of the leaders say the last-minute advertisement campaign had let down the party. The good work done by the government should have been projected over the last 2-3 years instead of waiting for the eleventh hour, they add.

Congress leaders also pointed out that there was no coordination between the state party unit and the government, resulting in too many committees (coordination, manifesto and sub-committees) taking up campaign work. There were nearly 30-35 committees. The manifesto committee alone had 38 members including those of various sub-committees.

A senior leader, on condition of anonymity, said that despite being the coordination committee chairman, former chief minister Ashok Chavan was tied up in Bhokar constituency from where his wife was contesting the election, resulting in overall coordination going haywire.

Narayan Rane was the campaign committee chief and he travelled extensively through out the state. But actress Nagma accompanied him everywhere and that did not have any positive impact. According to a veteran leader, Nagma as star campaigner had proved counter productive as she couldn't speak in Marathi. Where ever she went, people were taking her picture on mobile phones bringing down the seriousness of the campaign.

Another leader pointed out that central leaders like leader of opposition Ghulam Nabi Azad had just addressed press conferences, and at one or two places he refused to address the public rally citing low turn out. At one or two places, Azad left the padyatra after being part of it for just five minutes, saying he had a phone call from the high command.

Knew defeat was imminent

Many leaders are now saying the Congress high command had sensed defeat and that's why party president Sonia Gandhi and vice-president Rahul Gandhi did not attend many rallies in the state. When contacted over phone, state president Manikrao Thakare expressed confidence that Congress would improve its performance to remain the single largest party in the state. He also said there were no signs of dissent within the party after exit polls (results) had come out.

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