Atleast two Congress candidates withdraw from contest in the country for obvious reasons and later joined BJP. But a Congress’s nominee for Puri Lok Sabha seat in Odisha Sucharita Mohanty has returned her party ticket for lack of funding to run her campaign.
Mohanty claimed there is groundswell of support for Congress this election and people are all set to throw out the BJP government in Centre and BJD in the State.
She wrote to party general secretary K.C. Venugopal returning her ticket as her Lok Sabha polls campaign had been hit hard due to lack of funds. She added her crowd funding found only little success and with lack of funding from the party, she wouldn’t be able to carry out a campaign in Puri.
“Our campaign in the Puri Parliamentary constituency has been hit hard because the party has denied me funding. AICC Odisha in-charge Ajoy Kumar ji categorically asked me to fend for myself. I was a salaried professional journalist who entered electoral politics 10 years ago. I have given all I have into my campaign in Puri,” She added in her letter.
Further she claimed that it is clear that only fund crunch is holding us back from a winning campaign in Puri. “I regret that without party funding, it won’t be possible to carry out the campaign in Puri. I, therefore, return the INC ticket for the Puri parliamentary constituency herewith,” she said in her letter.
Mohanty is the daughter of former Congress MP Brajamohan Mohanty. However, Mohanty said she will remain a loyal Congress worker and her leader is Rahul Gandhi. Sucharita has been fielded for the Puri Lok Sabha seat against BJP national spokesperson Sambit Patra and BJD candidate Arup Patnaik, a former Mumbai Police Commissioner.