JAIPUR: The Indian voter has always been capable of throwing up surprises and the BJP will also get to know about it one day, Congress leader Shashi Tharoor said on Sunday.

His remarks came in the backdrop of the party’s debacle and drubbing in the just-concluded assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Goa, Punjab and Manipur.

The Congress could have done much better in Uttarakhand, and in Goa, “we had very good chances of being the single largest party”, Tharoor said at the Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF).

“But mind you in both the states the number of voters are relatively small, and that perhaps contributed,” the MP from Thiruvananthapuram said.

In the politically crucial Uttar Pradesh, despite a high-pitched campaign led by Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, the party could manage to win only two of the 403 assembly seats with the vote share plummeting to a meagre 2.33 per cent and most of its candidates losing security deposits.

Priyanka Gandhi Vadra did remarkable and energetic campaigning for the party, and “from my point of view, I don’t think that the Congress per se can be faulted because on the grounds of one person’s campaigning”, Tharoor said.

“I think the issues are rather larger for the party as well as for party viability in some states where our presence has been systematically going down,” he said.

On Priyanka Gandhi’s campaigning, the MP said, “You would have seen her everywhere, including getting arrested a couple of times by the Uttar Pradesh Police. You have seen her very much on the spot and running through the state.”

The 66-year-old leader also expressed surprise over political analysts describing the results as a “foregone conclusion”, saying very few predicted BJP’s victory until the exit polls came out.

“If it was a foregone conclusion, all the pundits should have been saying that for the last five-six weeks of election campaign. Very few, if any did, it was only when the exit polls were coming out that the tale turned and people said BJP is going to win.”

“Until then there was no question in my mind that most of people were expecting a very, very close fight, and some were saying anecdotally that Samajwadi Party was ahead,” Tharoor said.

The Indian voter has the capacity to surprise and one day, they will also surprise the BJP.

“But right now they have given the BJP what it wanted,” he said.

The JLF’s 15th edition started here on Thursday and is being held in a hybrid format for the first time since its inception in 2006.

It was held virtually from March 5 to 9 because of Covid.

Turkish bestselling novelist Elif Shafak, American writer and 2002 Pulitzer Prize for fiction finalist Jonathan Franzen, South African novelist and 2021 Booker winner Damon Galgut, Australian author and 2003 Booker winner DBC Pierre, English actor-writer Rupert Everett, and eminent Jamaican poet Kei Miller are among the 250 authors participating in the JLF this year.

KOLKATA: Days after switching over to the TMC from the BJP, veteran leader Joy Prakash Majumder stirred a controversy as he claimed that Leader of Opposition in West Bengal Assembly Suvendu Adhikari’s win against Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in the 2021 assembly polls from Nandigram was not by fair means.

Majumder, who was suspended by the BJP in the last week of January for “anti-party activities”, claimed that it was “baffling” how Adhikari went on to clinch the seat, just hours after Banerjee was declared winner from the constituency in Purba Medinipur district.

“I remember Suvendu had stated on the night of May 2 that he had to use tricks to win Nandigram,” the newly appointed vice-president of the TMC, who was once a fierce critic of Mamata Banerjee, told reporters on Saturday.

“The counting process was not transparent in Nandigram. By sleight of hand, Suvendu suddenly pipped Mamata Banerjee, who was initially declared the winner,” Majumder said.

Former state minister Rajib Bandyopadhyay, who had unsuccessfully contested from Domjur on a BJP ticket and returned to the TMC shortly after, also claimed that Majumder’s assertions were 100 per cent true.

“I know Suvendu Adhikari was not declared the winner in a fair manner. I can vouch for that,” Bandyopadhyay said.

In a tongue-in-cheek Twitter post in Bengali, Adhikari described the press meet of the Trinamool Congress leaders as a “farce” conducted by an “extortionist” party.

Sharing a famous Bengali poem by Satyendra Nath Dutta, he indicated that he would not reply to the charges as it would be below his dignity.

The BJP leader said the press conference of the “Tolamool” party reminded him of Dutta’s poem “Uttam ebong Adham” (Good and Bad).

The last stanza of that poem tells the reader that it is below the dignity of a human to bite back a dog that had bitten him.

“Tola” is a Bengali slang meaning extorted money.

Adhikari also shared a picture of the proverbial three wise monkeys embodying the maxim: “See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil”.

Though Adhikari avoided a direct reply, BJP state spokesperson Samik Bhattacharya trashed the allegations, stating that Majumder and Bandyopadhyay were revealing their “true colours” after crossing over to the TMC.

“Majumder is trying to raise his ratings before the new party supremo against whom he had levelled snide remarks in the past. Footages of his comments at BJP press briefings are still available. Will he take back all those comments now?” Bhattacharya sought to know.

Talking about Rajib Bandyopadhyay, the BJP spokesperson said, “I guess he wants to impress the TMC supremo by making these false claims. Given that he has been shifted to Tripura to look after the affairs of the TMC there, the former Domjur MLA must be desperately trying to get back.”

According to the Election Commission, Adhikari defeated Mamata Banerjee by over 1,900 votes in Nandigram.

The announcement was made just hours after reports suggested the TMC supremo had bagged the seat.

Banerjee later moved the Calcutta High Court challenging the Nandigram verdict.

She was elected to the Assembly from Bhabanipur later in 2021.

LUCKNOW: The BSP on Sunday said that despite its best efforts to defeat the BJP in the Uttarakhand Assembly polls, the party won because Muslims chose the wrong alternative.

The BSP arrived at the conclusion at a meeting of office-bearers and workers of its Uttarakhand unit with party president Mayawati here to review its performance in the just concluded assembly polls.

“It was found during the review (meeting) that like Uttar Pradesh, in Uttarakhand too, a lot of effort was put in to defeat the ruling BJP but especially the people of the Muslim community made a mistake in choosing the right alternative.

Due to this, despite the strong resentment among people against the BJP on issues like poverty, inflation, unemployment and its arrogant and autocratic attitude, the BJP benefitted again,” the BSP said in a statement.

“It was also felt at the meeting that if the attitude of these people does not change in future, then it will be very difficult to resolve the problem,” it said.

The BSP won only two seats in the 70-member Uttarakhand Assembly and got a mere 4.82 per cent of the total votes.

The BJP won 47 seats.

It created history by retaining power in the hill state, where every other previous government was voted out in the past.

Referring to rival political parties, Mayawati said it should be kept in mind that the BSP’s opponents use money power and are adept at doing “dirty politics”.

She also asked party workers not to get demoralised by the election results and work to address the shortcomings.

NEW DELHI: Days after its election debacle in five states, the Congress’ top decision-making body on Sunday brainstormed over the way forward amid calls for large-scale reforms to revive the party’s dwindling electoral fortunes.

Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma and Mukul Wasnik were the only three from the Group of 23 leaders who participated in the meeting of the CWC, which has a large number of Gandhi family loyalists.

Former prime minister Manmohan Singh did not attend the meeting. Senior party leader A K Antony was also not present as he has contracted Covid.

The Congress lost Punjab to the Aam Aadmi Party, could not wrest Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur from the BJP and the party’s tally in politically crucial Uttar Pradesh fell to its lowest.

While Sonia Gandhi has not been actively campaigning for some time, Rahul Gandhi, along with Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, had been the star campaigner for the Congress in the polls, with the brother-sister duo also playing a major role in key decisions of the party.

Despite a high-pitched campaign led by Priyanka Gandhi, the Congress could manage to win only two of the 403 assembly seats in Uttar Pradesh with the vote share plummeting to a meagre 2.33 percent and most of its candidates losing security deposits.

Ahead of the meeting, the chorus for making Rahul Gandhi Congress president again grew louder as several leaders and workers voiced support for him to take on the mantle of party chief.

Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot said no one was taking on Prime Minister Narendra Modi as Rahul Gandhi does and was fighting resolutely.

“The prime minister has to start his speech after targeting Rahul Gandhi, you can understand what this means. All of us want that Rahul ji should take on the mantle of party leadership,” Gehlot told reporters.

Karnataka Congress president D K Shivakumar also backed the idea to make Gandhi the party chief.

“As I have said it earlier as well, Sh. Rahul Gandhi should take up the Congress presidency in a full time role immediately. This is the wish of millions of Congress workers like me,” he tweeted.

Congress workers from around Delhi, who converged near the party office, were not allowed to enter the AICC headquarter as traffic was held up and the road outside the party office was barricaded by the police.

A group led by Delhi Congress leaders, including Alka Lamba, voiced support for Rahul Gandhi to lead the party and raised slogans in his and Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi’s favour.

Rahul Gandhi had resigned as Congress president after the party suffered its second consecutive defeat in general elections in 2019.

Sonia Gandhi, who took over the reins of the party again as interim president, had also offered to quit in August 2020 after strong criticism by a section of leaders, referred to as G-23, but the CWC had urged her to continue.

Earlier in the day, top Congress leaders discussed the party’s strategy for the upcoming Budget Session of Parliament and decided to work in coordination with other like-minded parties to raise issues of public importance.

The meeting of the Congress Parliamentary strategy group was held at the residence of party president Sonia Gandhi.

MUMBAI: BJP MLA Nitesh Rane has written to Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray requesting that the recently-released film ‘The Kashmir Files’ be exempted from entertainment tax in the state.

“‘The Kashmir Files’ movie, which depicts Hindus who fell prey to Muslim terrorism, should be declared tax-free in the state,” Rane stated in the letter written in Marathi.

Written and directed by Vivek Agnihotri and produced by Zee Studios, the film depicts the exodus of Kashmiri Hindus from Kashmir following systematic killings of people from the community by Pakistan-backed terrorists.

It stars Anupam Kher, Darshan Kumar, Mithun Chakraborty and Pallavi Joshi among others.

On Sunday, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh governments decided to make ‘The Kashmir Files’ movie tax-free.

Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai on Sunday also the same.

“Kudos to @vivekagnihotri for #TheKashmirFiles, a blood-curdling, poignant & honest narrative of the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits from their home land. To lend our support to the movie & encourage our people to watch it, we will make the movie tax-free in Karnataka,” Bommai tweeted.

Meanwhile, a ruckus erupted outside the Inox multiplex here in sector 4 of the millennium city, screening the film, on Sunday over the cancellation of tickets of some visitors.

Incensed over the denial of entry to the movie hall despite having tickets booked in advance with them, some of the audiences entered into a scuffle with the cinema hall’s security personnel, necessitating intervention by police.

The trouble began when some visitors were denied entry to the hall despite having tickets while the movie hall managers said they had to cancel the tickets to reissue them without tax after the Haryana government made the movie tax-free, said police.

The situation was brought under control after the movie-goers and cinema hall owner reached a compromise over cancelled tickets, it added.

“To implement the revised tax-free pricing for the movie as per the Haryana government’s order and to ensure that the benefit of the same is passed on to the maximum number of guests with immediate effect, the tickets which were already issued with the tax amount, had to be reissued,” Inox Cinema said in an official statement.

“This process required reprogramming of the existing tickets and the same was communicated to guests so that they can rebook the ticket and enjoy the movie at a lower tax-free price,” the statement explained.

“We are extremely heartened by the response we have received for the movie across the country and are looking forward to welcoming guests to enjoy it in coming days,” it added.

INDORE: Union Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia on Sunday said that regular international flights will resume from March 27 as the coronavirus situation in India has improved now.

However, special international flights have been operating between India and about 35 other countries since July 2020 under air bubble.

“I have already given a direction that restrictions on international flights, which were imposed due to COVID-19, be lifted,” Scindia said on the sidelines of an event here.

“The international flight services would be fully restored from March 27 as they were before the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic,” he added.

The minister also said that the Modi government held talks with the heads of Ukraine’s neighbouring countries, like Romania, Moldova, Slovakia and Poland, and set up a corridor for the evacuation of 18,000 Indian students from the war-hit country under the ‘Operation Ganga’.

It was for the first time that so many Indians were rescued from a war-ravaged country, he claimed.

“Apart from the Indian students, we evacuated some citizens of our neighbouring countries like Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal, from Ukraine,” Scindia said.

RANCHI: Jharkhand legislator Dipika Pandey Singh on Sunday resigned from the post of national secretary of the Congress and the party’s co-in charge of Uttarakhand after its defeat in the recent assembly polls in the northern state.

“Taking responsibility of the defeats in Uttarakhand assembly elections, I have resigned as national secretary, co-in charge of Uttarakhand. I thank leadership for giving me the opportunity to serve the party at national level,” she wrote on Twitter.

Singh is an MLA from Mahagama assembly constituency in Jharkhand’s Godda district. In Uttarakhand, the BJP will form a second successive government, the first in the state’s 21-year history.

The saffron party clinched 47 seats, 11 more than the magic figure of 36, while the Congress bagged 19 assembly constituencies and others four.

The Congress lost Punjab to the AAP, could not wrest Goa and Manipur from the BJP and the grand old party’s tally in politically crucial Uttar Pradesh fell to its lowest.

CHANDIGARH: Former Punjab minister and senior Congress leader Balbir Singh Sidhu on Sunday said that the Congress leadership scripted its own defeat by giving power to turncoats and opportunists who were alien to the Congress, its history and culture.

Asserting that the Congress “committed one blunder after another”, Balbir Sidhu said removing Amarinder Singh as the chief minister proved to be the last straw that broke the camel’s back which eventually led to the “complete collapse” of the party and the government.

Amarinder Singh was unseated from the chief minister’s post last year following a bitter feud between him and Navjot Singh Sidhu.

In a statement here, the former health minister said the party’s third mistake was refusing to appoint Sunil Jakhar as the chief minister just because he was a Hindu, despite the support of an overwhelming majority of the party MLAs and the secular character and culture of the Congress.

“If the Congress had believed in politics of religion, Giani Zail Singh wouldn’t be the president, Dr Manmohan Singh wouldn’t be the prime minister and Buta Singh wouldn’t be the home minister,” he said.

“All this was followed by the appointment of Charanjit Singh Channi, who again was not a real Congressman, as he had tried his luck with the Shiromani Akali Dal and the People’s Party of Punjab before joining the Congress. The Congress party and the government was handed over to rank outsiders,” Balbir Sidhu asserted.

He said the way the party arbitrarily denied tickets to senior and veteran leaders like Amrik Singh Dhillon, Jagmohan Singh Kang, Ajaib Singh Bhatti and Kewal Singh Dhillon was yet another fatal mistake by the Congress leadership.

“It was strange and surprising that the party looked like it was in a race with itself in repeating one blunder after another to cause its own doom,” he said.

The three-time former MLA from Mohali pointed out that just before the appointment of Navjot Singh Sidhu as the Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee president, everyone was of the unanimous view that the Congress will repeat itself in 2022.

“But the countdown for doom started the day Navjot Sidhu took over as the PCC president”, he said, adding that the party made no efforts to reign him in.

Balbir Sidhu said the way the Punjab Congress chief and the chief minister indulged in open war of words, putting the party in a state of “civil war”, left the field wide open for the opposition.

“People got fed up with this civil war and they decided to teach us a lesson,” he said.

Besides, Balbir Sidhu said, “The language used by Navjot Sidhu and Channi during the campaign antagonised a large section of the electorate.”

While Navjot Sidhu allegedly addressed former minister Anil Joshi as a “kaala Brahmin”, Channi allegedly used derogatory language against the migrant population.

This antagonised certain communities and they voted against the Congress not only in Punjab, but also in Uttar Pradesh, he said.

The former minister said instead of owning up responsibility, those responsible were “shamelessly” glorifying themselves as if they had won “Param Vir Chakra”.

He said those responsible for the debacle must be made accountable, lest the Congress got “destroyed beyond redemption”.

The Aam Aadmi Party romped home with 92 of the 117 assembly seats by decimating the Congress and the SAD-BSP combine.