BJP fought polls against entire state machinery, claims Bernard

SHILLONG, April 4: BJP vice president Bernard Marak on Tuesday said the party could not fare well in Garo Hills in the Assembly elections as its candidates did not get a level playing field.
Marak told journalists in Shillong that if the contest was among candidates, the BJP would have won many seats. He alleged the party had to fight the polls against the entire state machinery.
“In the last two days of the elections, most BJP candidates were not even allowed to go out and there were people in civil dresses outside the gate of the candidates. If they had gone out, they would have been implicated in some cases like distribution of money,” Marak said, hinting at a conspiracy.
Admitting that the BJP also made some mistakes in its calculations, he said the party’s focus will be on winning both Shillong and Tura seats in next year’s Lok Sabha elections based on the schemes launched and sanctioned by the central government.
He alleged that the benefits of most central schemes are not reaching the beneficiaries. He said there is scarcity of drinking water despite the Jal Jeevan Mission. Similarly, there are PMAY beneficiaries but no houses, he added.  Stating that the BJP’s war against corruption will continue, he claimed the party’s vote share is increasing. He said people who are against corruption are voting for the BJP.
Marak also said that he is not projecting himself as the BJP’s Tura candidate in the Lok Sabha polls. He said his focus is on strengthening the party but if it wants him to contest, he will have no comment to make.