Seat sharing for LS polls not done in meaningful way: D Raja

NEW DELHI: Seat sharing agreements could not be done in a meaningful way during the Lok Sabha polls, and all secular parties, especially the Congress, need to introspect over the results of the general elections and the recent assembly poll results, Communist Party of India general secretary D Raja said on Monday.

Addressing a press conference here after a meeting of the party's national council, Raja also said the Left parties were not given proper space in the INDIA bloc.

"At the time of Parliament elections, the seat-sharing arrangement could not be done in a meaningful way. Some problems remained. Otherwise, the results would have been different also," Raja said.

"Then the Assembly elections --“ Haryana, Jammu and Kashmir, Jharkhand, Maharashtra --“ the seat-sharing arrangement could not be done well. Otherwise, results could have been different. Here, our party has demanded that all parties must do serious introspection," he said.

"Particularly, the Congress party should do serious introspection," Raja added.

He said the CPI and all the Left parties are the "uncompromising political ideological forces fighting against the BJP and the RSS combine".

"But at the time of elections, the Left parties were not accommodated as they should have (been). The Left parties cannot be left out or sidelined. And in the emerging situation in the country, the Left parties are a strong, committed force against the right-wing, conservative, communal, fascist forces," he said.

"This is what our party has pointed out. This has to be taken note by all secular democratic parties, in particular the Congress party. In the coming days, we all will have to work together, fight together," he said.

The country is passing through a very critical period when the ruling BJP and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) combine are posing a "grave threat" to the Constitution, he alleged.

"We have celebrated the 75th anniversary of the Constitution, but how to uphold the constitutional values, the constitutional morality? So the situation demands the unity of secular democratic forces to save the nation, to save the Constitution," he said.

Talking about the recent Haryana and Maharashtra polls, where the BJP retained power, Raja said the Left parties were dissatisfied how smaller parties, including the Left, were not properly accomodated.

"Things would have been different. Every possibility was there to defeat the BJP. Why it did not happen? So everyone should do serious introspection," he said.

He said all secular and democratic parties need serious introspection on how to work together, and how to accommodate each other.

"Here, the Congress, being the largest party, it has a responsibility to be accommodative to other parties," he added.

The opposition INDIA bloc, formed ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, won 234 seats altogether, while the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) won 293 seats.

In the subsequent assembly polls, BJP won in Haryana and Maharashtra, while the National Conference-led alliance won in Jammu and Kashmir, and the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM)-led alliance won in Jharkhand.