Mukul confident of winning Tura by-poll, rejects 'sympathy factor'

FROM OUR STAFF CORRESPONDENT

SHILLONG, April 21: Notwithstanding the purported sympathy wave that favors the tiol People’s Party (NPP) in the forthcoming by-elections to the Tura Parliamentary constituency, Chief Minister Mukul Sangma felt that such assumptions will not work if the party functiories can properly inform the voters about the successful implementation of various development schemes during the past six year by the state government.

The by-elections to the Tura seat was necessitated after the demise of former Lok Sabha speaker Purno A Sangma on May 16. Virtually rubbishing the “sympathy factor” Chief Minister Mukul Sangma said, “I don’t subscribe to the idea of sympathy factor. Every election is a test and it is up to us (Congress) to prove a point before the electorates that we have done our best for the development of the state.”

Sangma said, “Our thrust now is to convince the people with humility that our government and our candidate are better than the rest.”

The Chief Minister indicated that the inner contradictions within the congress party cost them dearly in the elections to the Garo Hills Autonomous District Council (GHADC).