Raipur: Chhattisgarh chief minister Raman Singh ridiculed the Congress for “running after other parties” for a grand alliance and compared the party to a “beggar.” Speaking to this newspaper, Dr Singh took a jibe at the Congress’ proposed “Mahagath-bandhan” and said, “Congress being a national party is now begging to other parties to strike an alliance. What an irony.”
Refuting speculations that the party was fighting high anti-incumbency in the state, Mr Singh claimed during the 2019, BJP will win all the 11 Lok Sabha seats. At this juncture, while BJP has 10 seats Congress has one.
Talking about much-hyped “Mahagathband-han” or united opposition in last couple of months, Dr Singh said that after facing defeat in 21 states Congress has surrender before the regional parties only to oppose Narendra Modi and his development agenda. “As the Congress has realised that they cannot defeat Mr Modi and his agenda by its own, they surrender and begging in front of regional parties to strike an allia-nce ahead of next general election in 2019. By doing this what they want to show? Congress has lost its identity by demeaning its status as national party by going so low to form an alliance with regional parties. Congress is begging in front of regional parties to form an alliance,” he added.
The confident three-term chief minister of Chhatisgarh said that in last four Lok Sabha elections, the BJP won nine to 10 seats out of 11, including during 10 years of Dr Manmohan Singh government. “BJP’s position has improved a lot and we are going to form the government in Chhatisgarh for fourth term. In Lok Sabha, improving our previous tally, the BJP will win 11 out of 11,” he added.
Denying any impact of united opposition in Chhatisgarh, Dr Singh said that there is no presence of parties like SP, Left or others, but here (in Chhatisgarh) Congress is divided in place of divided Opposition. “There is small influence group like former chief minister Ajit Jogi, who is more harmful for Congress than BJP, but they have no impact of large picture. A new entrant (AAP) also announced its debut but failed to open its account in Panchayat elections, still they contest assembly polls,” said Chhatisgarh chief minister.
