A day after the Congress held its review meeting about Haryana poll debacle, Chief Minister of Rajasthan and senior Congress leader said the Congress will go deep into this matter and find out what really happened. He said the country and the world were seeing that Congress was winning and there was no news of defeat from anywhere, be it exit polls or media.
"These results were shocking, so it is important to get to the bottom of it. We have also complained to the Election Commission about the EVM machine. For the first time in elections, we are seeing that such situations arose and the results were reversed. Actually, many BJP leaders were also saying that Congress was winning. These are all things but I believe that until you get to the bottom of this matter, it is not right to say anything about it," he said.
On any possible impact of Haryana elections results on the upcoming elections in Maharashtra and Jharkhand, Ashok Gehlot said, "Alliances are going on there, but those who say that what will happen there, now that we have lost here - party obviously gets a little jolted, workers feel it. But situation comes under control with time. The situation was different in Haryana, the situation in Maharashtra is different. How is the governance there, what are the issues there, what are the public sentiments there are all different. So, I feel that these results won't have much of an impact there."
On Congress party's review meeting over Haryana election results, Gehlot said postmortem is being done. "A meeting was held yesterday, Rahul Gandhi and Mallikarjun Kharge decided that a platform will be set up that all our candidates - both winning & losing and leaders of the state will delve deep and assess what actually happened. The entire country was watching that Congress was winning, the state was seeing that Congress was winning...But what happened suddenly? Surprising results came in. So, it is essential to reach the roots of it. It is being said that there were factions there, they were overconfident, caste equations changed - these things keep being said...But we have seen a situation for the first time, that the results get overturned. Nobody can understand how it happened in Haryana. Even BJP leaders were saying that the Congress is winning...But I think it is not right to comment unless you go in the depth."
On Thursday, the Congress top brass on Thursday held a review meeting on the party's shock defeat in Haryana Assembly polls and decided to form a fact-finding team that will speak to all its candidates to find out the reasons for the debacle.
The Congress leaders during the meeting discussed the possible reasons for the "unexpected" results in Haryana and decided to set up the team to ascertain the reasons behind such results and also look into complaints of "discrepancies" in EVMs, as alleged by party candidates.
Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, former party chief Rahul Gandhi, AICC general secretary organisation KC Venugopal, AICC senior observers for the polls Ashok Gehlot and Ajay Maken, as well as AICC secretaries for the state, participated in the review meeting.
