When Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) fought the Lok Sabha and Assembly elections together, it won big at the Centre but failed in the state. “At that time, the idea of a 'new ally' did not exist. In the Bihar elections, Congress and RJD had an alliance with 10 parties, and due to the backdrop of vote theft, the results turned out differently. Now, workers feel that the local self-government elections should be contested independently, and this sentiment must be respected. All parties must remain patient,” said Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee President Harshvardhan Sapkal.
Speaking to reporters in Buldhana, the Congress state president said the party is engaged in a major battle against the BJP. “The RSS was founded to eliminate the Congress ideology. Today, the BJP and Congress represent two opposing ideologies in the country—this is an old ideological struggle. The BJP–RSS position that only a handful of people should become wealthy is unacceptable to Congress, and Rahul Gandhi has blown the conch for the biggest battle against this mindset. Congress's ideological struggle is against the BJP and the capitalists,” he said.
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Calling on other parties to join Rahul Gandhi in this fight, he said that each party has its own views—something Uddhav Thackeray has also acknowledged. “If a new party is to join the INDIA alliance, it must first be proposed at the national level; without a proposal, what is there to discuss?” said Sapkal.
Speaking about the alliance with Prakash Ambedkar and his Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi, the Congress state president said that Congress had given local leaders the authority to form alliances or tie-ups, and Vanchit had taken the same position.
“Accordingly, district-level leaders of both parties held discussions and decided on the alliance. Later, if any hurdles arose in the discussions, a middle path can still be found. The situation of both parties filing separate nominations could have been avoided. Congress and Vanchit workers from both sides want the alliance to continue, and the alliance has already been declared—there is no question of breaking it,” he said.
In this situation, he said, the Congress will take positive steps to move forward. “All constitutionalists must come together to carry forward the battles of Shiv, Shahu, and Phule, and we will work towards that,” added Sapkal. |
