Raj Babbar Leads Exit Queue as Resignations Pile Up on Rahul Gandhi's Desk After Election Rout

New Delhi: Even as speculation mounts that he may resign as party president at the Congress Working Meeting on Saturday, Rahul Gandhi finds himself juggling multiple offers to quit from state unit chiefs over the election rout.

The first to send his resignation to Gandhi was Uttar Pradesh Congress chief Raj Babbar who took responsibility for the party’s dismal performance in the state which sends 80 MPs to the Lok Sabha.

“The results are depressing for the Uttar Pradesh Congress. I find myself guilty of not discharging my responsibility in a proper manner… I will meet the leadership and apprise it of my views. Congratulations to the winners for winning the confidence of the people," Babbar tweeted.

Of the 80 seats in Uttar Pradesh, the Congress managed to win only the Rae Bareli seat of Sonia Gandhi and Babbar, who contested from Fatehpur Sikri, lost by a margin of over 4,95,065 votes to BJP's Rajkymar Chahar. The BJP and its ally Apna Dal (S) won 64 seats, while the SP-BSP alliance won 15 seats.

The biggest upset for the Congress came in Amethi where a dogged Smriti Irani stunned Rahul Gandhi, defeating the Congress chief by around 55,000 votes. Gandhi will still be an MP, but from Kerala’s Wayanad this time.

Accepting moral responsibility for Gandhi’s defeat, the Congress’ Amethi unit chief Yogendra Mishra, too, tendered his resignation.

Odisha Congress chief Niranjan Patnaik also resigned from his post, claiming moral responsibility for the dismal showing in the state. The Congress managed to win just nine assembly seats in the state while only one of its Lok Sabha candidates won in the state. In the 2014 polls for Odisha’s 147-member assembly, 16 Congress candidates had won. The party had failed to get victory in any of the 21 Lok Sabha seats in the state in 2014.

Also queueing up to resign was Karnataka Congress campaign committee president HK Patil who wrote to Rahul Gandhi, saying “It is time for all of us to introspect. I feel it is my moral duty to own up the responsibility. Hence, I submit my resignation from the post.”

The Congress chief, however, was yet to reject or accept any of the resignations. A call is likely to be taken during the post-mortem of the election outcome at the Congress Working Committee meeting on Saturday.