Raijor Dal alliance talks on hold: Congress

Assam Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC) president Gaurav Gogoi said discussions on a possible electoral alliance with regional party Raijor Dal for the Assam assembly elections have been put on hold.

In a social media post on Wednesday Gogoi said, "Since the people of Assam wanted, we had sought an alliance with Raijor Dal to contest the upcoming assembly elections as a united opposition. Unfortunately, despite many efforts, we have not been able to create a favourable and hopeful environment for an alliance with Raijor Dal in the way the people of Assam had expected."

He said the primary objective of any electoral alliance is to realistically assess the winnability of seats and accordingly arrive at a workable arrangement. "Keeping this aspect in mind, we had moved forward on the matter with a broad perspective through seat adjustments. Various factors prevented the alliance. For the time being, we have decided to take a break from the issue of an alliance with Raijor Dal. We will reconsider the matter again at a later stage."


Raijor Dal chief Akhil Gogoi said, "Congress must not think of itself as America and feel that Raijor Dal as Iran."

Congress recently released a list of 42 candidates for this year's assembly polls. Assam has 126 seats.

The Opposition alliance had announced that it will begin a joint campaign across the state in the coming days. Four parties came together to signal a united political front ahead of the elections.

Gaurav Gogoi had recently said that alliance partners will soon hold coordinated campaign meetings across Assam. "We have only 30 days in hand and these 30 days are extremely important," he had said.

He said the parties have decided to begin joint campaign meetings at fixed dates and locations across the state. The parties include the Assam Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC), Assam Jatiya Parishad (AJP), All Party Hill Leaders Conference (APHLC) and Communist Party of India (Marxist).