New Delhi:
Congress president Sonia Gandhi today called her senior colleagues to discuss the party's poll debacle in four major states, as a key ally said voters had shown their anger at an "indecisive and weak leadership."
Sharad Pawar, whose NCP supports Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's UPA government at the Centre, said a "weak leadership had led to the rise of pseudo-activists."
He did not name Arvind Kejriwal and his year-old Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), which scored a spectacular victory in Delhi and pushed the Congress to a poor number three position.
Mr Pawar, 72, said the poll verdict raised questions that needed serious thinking. "People need strong, decisive and result oriented leaders. They do not want weak rulers, but they want those who will formulate policies & programs for poor and implement them with firmness," he critiqued.
The veteran politician, who left the Congress in 1999 to form his own party, compared current leaders with prime minister Indira Gandhi, who was assassinated in 1984. "She used to implement decisions with vigour. That is why, during her tenure, this 'jhola' class (activists) which offers free advice, was not there. During her time such elements that have no connect with the ground reality never surfaced."
Another ally Farooq Abdullah, was kinder as he blamed the Congress' defeat on price rise and insisted that he would remain with the UPA coalition, no matter what.
The Congress was not only decimated in Delhi, but it lost decisively in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh.
Party president Sonia Gandhi and her son and vice president Rahul Gandhi both promised soul-searching by the party and its transformation ahead of the national election due by May.
"Naturally this result calls for deep introspection. We have to understand to look at the many reasons for these defeats. We have to look to the way we took or did not take well enough our message to the people," Mrs Gandhi said on Sunday.