Assembly elections 2013: why Congress lost Chhattisgarh

Raipur: Chhattisgarh state Congress president, Charan Das Mahant, took the first flight to Delhi today, a day after losing the state to the BJP. Mr Mahant is expected to report to the party high command on why the Congress failed in the state for the third consecutive time.

Was it incumbent Chief Minister Raman Singh's charisma, or was it infighting within the Congress that resulted in the debacle in a state that was too close to call?

Chhattisgarh witnessed a thrilling contest between the two rivals in the assembly polls, considered the semifinals before general elections, due by May 2014. After swinging all day long, the final tally had the BJP winning 49 seats and the Congress 39.

Chhattsigarh has always seen a close fight between the political rivals, but the Congress was certain to make it this time. Party president Sonia Gandhi was hopeful till the last vote was counted.

Though the Congress won the tribals in the south, it lost out to the urban voter. Ajit Jogi, Congress leader and the state's first chief minister, blamed anti-incumbency against their sitting MLAs for the defeat.

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"We repeated our sitting MLAs; 35 of them out of which 27 lost. That means there was some kind of local anti-incumbency against our MLAs," he said.

But political analyst like Sunil Kumar, editor of a local newspaper, feels Mr Jogi is a part of the problem for the Congress.

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"In Congress print campaign, Jogi's face was one of the eight or ten faces. But in the BJP ads, they tried to project as if Jogi would come to power if voters chose Congress. He is not liked in urban areas. BJP probably exploited that sentiment," he said.

It wasn't just the urban vote that swung in BJPs favour, Raman Singh's cheap rice policy also got him the poor man's vote. Nine out of ten reserved seats chose the BJP. This despite the fact that his government reduced the reservation for Scheduled Castes in government jobs from 16% to 12%.

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While the Congress gained some sympathy vote because of the attack on its top leadership in May, infighting within the party also impacted the campaign. Finally, reports of so many scams at the national level added to the party's woes in the state.