Congress expels seven leaders for six years over alleged claims of ticket selling in Bihar polls
PATNA : The Bihar Congress on Monday expelled seven leaders from the partys primary membership for six years for harming the partys dignity by making what it described as baseless and misleading claims that tickets were sold in the recently concluded state assembly election. The action was taken through an order issued by the partys disciplinary committee chairman, Kapildeo Prasad Yadav. The committee also contended that the party had maintained complete transparency regarding the issues raised by the leaders in their alleged propaganda. Leaders who have been expelled from the party include former Congress Seva Dal vice-president Aditya Paswan, former state Congress vice-president Shakeelur Rahman, former Kisan Congress president Raj Kumar Sharma, former state Youth Congress president Raj Kumar Rajan, the partys EBC cell former president Kudan Gupta, Banka district Congress president Kanchana Kumari, and Ravi Golden from Nalanda district. On 18 November, the partys disciplinary committee had issued show-cause notices to 43 leaders, including former ministers and MLAs, for offences such as deviation from party lines and making anti-party statements, thereby allegedly impacting the Congresss prospects in the assembly polls. The committee had asked all the leaders to submit their replies within three days, failing which strict action, including expulsion from the party for up to six years, would be initiated. All the leaders who were issued notices were accused of giving statements from public platforms during the elections, which the party said were damaging to its reputation and had a bearing on the poll outcome. Congress MP Tariq had also recently urged the party high command to conduct an impartial review of the entire ticket distribution process, saying that action should be taken against those found guilty of committing irregularities at any level. We have said that the Pradesh Congress Committee should convene a meeting to discuss the entire election process and the results, and there should be a discussion about how we suffered such a massive defeat. Our party is a national party, he added. Meanwhile, Bihar Congress president Rajesh Kumar has asked all district party presidents and working presidents to review the partys performance in the recently concluded assembly polls. The Congress could win only six out of the 61 seats it contested. This was the second successive assembly election in which the partys performance remained dismal, as it had won only 19 out of the 70 seats it contested in the 2020 Bihar assembly election. The state Congress president has directed district presidents to convene review meetings in their respective districts soon to conduct an impartial and in-depth analysis of the political, organisational, and regional factors behind the election results. They have been asked to examine aspects such as voter turnout, booth-level activities, organisational strength, campaign issues, local factors and alliance conditions. District Congress presidents have been asked to send detailed review reports to the state Congress office immediately.
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