Ahead of MP elections, former CM Digvijaya Singh plunges into active political role in state

Bhopal: Ahead of Madhya Pradesh Assembly polls, former Chief Minister Digvijaya Singh has plunged into active political role in the state, holding tours in all constituencies to coordinate and mobilise the Congressmen at the booth level, focusing on those seats where his party has been losing for the last 3-4 terms.

After completing the Bharat Jodo Yatra (BJY), Rajya Sabha MP Singh started touring the state on February 17 after being given responsibility by Congress state chief and former CM Kamal Nath. Senior Congress leader Digvijaya was the coordinator of the BJY, a people outreach campaign of former party president Rahul Gandhi.

There are two phases of his campaign. In the first, Singh will cover 66 Assembly constituencies where Congress has continuously been losing for the last three-four elections, and it will complete by end of May. In the second phase, he will visit the remaining constituencies out of the total 230 seats in the state.

The Assembly elections are due in the state in November this year. Congress came to power in the previous polls but after switching to BJP by Jyotiraditya Scindia and his supporter MLAs, the Nath-led government was toppled in March 2020.

During the trip, party’s former general secretary Singh will hold two meetings for talks with party workers in every constituency. Significantly, in these meetings, an open platform is given to the primary members of the party including the sitting and former MPs, MLAs, party office bearers and the representatives of panchayats and local bodies for discussions together.

In this campaign, a space is provided for the workers of the booth and mandalam level to put their views and allow them for an informal discussion to solve the issues related to internal rifts. “For establishing coordination among the party leaders and workers, Digvijaya Singh Ji is one of the most capable leaders in Congress as he proved in the previous polls by holding the ‘Pangat Me Sangat’ campaign in every constituency to coordinate the party workers,” former Minister PC Sharma, who is MLA from Bhopal South-West seat, told Millennium Post. I claim that our party will register a grand victory in the upcoming polls due to his efforts of making to mobilise the workers at the booth level. Congress will also register a victory this time on those seats, wherein BJP has been winning for a long time,” Sharma said.

Singh had been appointed coordination committee chief ahead of the 2018 Assembly polls and Congress returned to power in the state after 15 years winning 114 seats. Singh held tours across the state to coordinate the party workers. Earlier, he has done the religious circumambulation of 3,500 kilometres of the holy river Narmada, a lifeline river of MP, on foot, covering a huge number of the constituencies of the state. During his tours, Digvijaya has also been focusing on wooing those BJP leaders who are feeling isolated in the party, keeping an eye on former MPs and MLAs and on leaders who are not getting importance in the saffron party. The recent joining of former BJP MP from Khargone Lok Sabha seat Makhan Singh Solanki into Congress in front of Digvijaya in a function in Silavad of Barwani is seen as a success of Singh’s strategy.

The aim behind the campaign is to strengthen the party organisation at the ground level by mobilising the booth-level workers and establishing coordination among them ahead of the Assembly elections, a party functionary said. Digvijaya has toured 13 constituencies so far — Berasia and Govindpura of the Bhopal district, these are Budhani, Timarni, Rampur Baghelan, Rewa, Majhgawan, Teonthar, Gwalior-15, Guna, Datia, Shivpuri and Bamhori.