The Congress on Monday asked why National Conference leader Omar Abdullah’s approach to matters concerning the Opposition INDIA bloc had changed after he became the chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir.
This came days after Abdullah said that the Congress cannot raise allegations regarding the manipulation of Electronic Voting Machines only when election results are not in its favour.
“It’s the Samajwadi Party, Nationalist Congress Party (Sharadchandra Pawar) and Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) that have spoken against Electronic Voting Machines,” Congress leader Manickam Tagore said in a social media post on Monday.
Tagore’s statement was regarding the Opposition parties’ announcement that they would move the Supreme Court over the alleged manipulation of Electronic Voting Machines in the recent Maharashtra Assembly elections.
The Congress, National Conference, Samajwadi Party, Nationalist Congress Party led by Sharad Pawar and Thackeray Sena are constituents of the INDIA bloc at the national level.
In Maharashtra, the Congress, Nationalist Congress Party (Sharadchandra Pawar), Thackeray Sena and Samajwadi Party constitute the Maha Vikas Aghadi, which managed to win only 46 seats out in the 288-member Assembly.
On November 23, the ruling Mahayuti alliance – comprising the Bharatiya Janata Party, the Shiv Sena group led by Eknath Shinde and the Nationalist Congress Party faction led by Ajit Pawar – won 230 seats.
On Wednesday, Tagore asked Abdullah, who was sworn in as the chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir on October 16, to check facts.
The Congress leader said that “the Congress Working Committee resolution clearly addresses the Election Commission of India” and posted a part of the resolution on X.
The party committee had stated in the resolution that it believes the “entire electoral process is being severely compromised”.
“Free and fair elections is a constitutional mandate that is being called into serious question by the partisan functioning of the Election Commission,” the Congress had said.
In an interview to PTI on Friday, Abdullah had said: “When you get a hundred plus members of Parliament using the same EVMs [Electronic Voting Machines], and you celebrate that as sort of a victory for your party, you can’t then a few months later turn around and say...we don’t like these EVMs because now the election results aren’t going the way we would like them to.”
He also said that the Congress was the “natural” leader of the alliance “by virtue of being the single largest party in Parliament and also having the Leader of Opposition in both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha”.
He added that the Congress also had a “pan-India footprint” that no other party from the alliance could lay claim to.
“Yet there is a sense of disquiet among some of the allies because they feel the Congress is not doing enough to justify it or to earn it or to keep it,” Abdullah told PTI. “That’s something the Congress might wish to consider.”
The interview came two months after the National Conference-Congress alliance won the Assembly polls in Jammu and Kashmir.
Days before his remarks, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on December 6 indicated that she was willing to lead the INDIA bloc if given the opportunity. A day later, Sharad Pawar also backed Banerjee’s claim.
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