Why does Congress always pull down its allies?

New Delhi: Out of the 29 seats it contested in the Jammu region, the Congress won just one — that too in Rajouri, which has a sizeable Muslim population.

Had the National Conference (NC) not swept the Kashmir valley, the Congress party's extremely poor show in the Jammu region would have prevented the INDIA bloc from forming the government in the Union Territory.

In Kashmir, the grand old party fought on 9 seats and won 5 - courtesy of the NC wave.

On the other hand, the NC contested 51 seats in alliance and won 42.

The CPM and the Jammu and Kashmir National Panthers Party were given one seat each. CPM's Mohammad Yousuf Tarigami once again won from his stronghold in the Kulgam constituency.

The NC, however, won seven out of the 13 seats it contested in the Jammu province as part of the alliance.

The NC visibly had a better strike rate than the Congress in this region, which the grand old party offered on a platter to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

From the Jammu region, the saffron party ended up winning 29 seats, four more than its 2014 tally of 25.

It is known to all that a section in the Congress had flagged concerns that the party's campaign was lacklustre in the Jammu region where the BJP was otherwise facing a tough time in spelling out the benefits of various measures such as abrogation of Article 370 and scrapping of the 'Darbar Move' practice.

Instead the Congress for strange reasons focussed on the Kashmir valley where the anger against the BJP was palpable and the NC was visibly ahead of its rivals.

In fact, NC leaders, including Omar Abdullah, had suggested that the Congress leadership should extensively campaign in the Jammu reports as the reports coming from there were not favourable to the INDIA bloc.

On a few occasions, the Congress had to cancel rallies of Rahul Gandhi and Mallikarjun Kharge due to logistical issues.

This is not the first time that Congress has proved to be a weak link in an alliance.

It was because of the Congress that the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD)-led mahagathbandhan (grand alliance) could not form the government in Bihar in 2020.

The Congress first demanded 70 seats which the RJD was unwilling to give. Bihar leaders then requested Sonia Gandhi to speak to Lalu Prasad and the RJD finally relented. Out of those 70 seats, the Congress managed to win just 19 seats.

On the other hand, the CPI(ML) that contested 19 seats registered a stellar performance by winning 12.

For its part, the RJD fought on 144 seats and won 75. Senior Congress leader Tariq Anwar had then publicly blamed his own party for letting down the Mahagathbandhan.