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New PCC chief gets a rousing welcome

By Our Special Correspondent

JAIPUR, JAN. 17 .The Rajasthan Congress showed some signs of life today after the setback it suffered in the recent Assembly elections as the newly appointed president of the Pradesh Congress Committee (I), Narain Singh, arrived here from Delhi. A large number of party workers turned up at the Jaipur railway station to receive him and take him in a procession to the Congress headquarters at Indira Gandhi Bhavan.

"We have to come out of `sadma' (shock) and get on to work,'' Mr.Singh said while addressing a gathering of workers outside the party office. "The voter response in the Assembly elections and in the Lok Sabha polls vary and you will realise it soon,'' he said.

Three hours' delay in the arrival of the Shatabdi Express did not deter the partymen who waited for him. Most of the crowd apparently hailed from the Shekhawati region, which forms part of Sikar district to which Narain Singh belongs.

Many senior leaders of the Congress in the State, including the former Chief Ministers, Ashok Gehlot, Shiv Charan Mathur, Heeralal Devpura, Jagannath Pahadia and the outgoing PCC (I) president, Girija Vyas, joined the meeting held to felicitate Narain Singh and B.D. Kalla, the newly elected leader of the Congress Legislature Party in the Rajasthan Assembly.

The new PCC (I) president, obviously a choice out of compulsion for the party after the debacle in the Assembly elections, sought the cooperation of all, especially of Mr.Gehlot and Dr.Vyas in leading the party in the next Lok Sabha elections. All the leaders who spoke, including Mr.Gehlot and Dr.Vyas, offered him wholehearted support.

"My first priority is to prepare the party for the Lok Sabha elections,'' Mr.Singh said later addressing the media persons. "I am not alone in this. All the party leaders and workers are with me,'' he claimed. The party workers would soon be asked to concentrate on updating the electoral rolls.

Mr.Singh said the Congress Government which ruled the State in the past did an `excellent' job though the party could not reap electoral benefits. This was partly due to the "overconfidence'' of the partymen who took victory for granted. "We did not reach out to the voter,'' he noted.

The Central assistance the present BJP Government was claiming to have got now too was the result of the previous Government in power reforms, road sector and other areas, Mr.Singh pointed out.

"If they talk about selling power outside Rajasthan it is because of our work,'' he asserted. Mr.Singh was confident of the support of the farming community to the Congress in the coming elections.

He poohpoohed the leadership claims of `certain self appointed men' of the Jat community in the State. The defeat of the wards of the said leaders was enough indication that the community rejected them, he claimed.

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