UP Assembly elections is not a setback for us: Jairam Ramesh

Kolkata, May 11(UNI) Denying that the Congress had faced any setback in Uttar Pradesh elections, Union Minister of State for Commerce Jairam Ramesh today said Rahul Gandhi was a ''marathon runner'' and his campaign was not a ''flop.'' '' The outcome of the UP Assembly elections is not a setback for us...Rahul Gandhi is a marathon man and the election campaign he carried out was aimed at 2009 Lok Sabha elections,'' he told reporters here.

The objective of the campaign by Rahul Gandhi was to increase the vote share and reinfuse life in the party and keep it prepared for 2009, he said.

While expecting that the percentage of votes for the Congress would increase 13 to 14 per cent from nine to eleven per cent recorded in 2002, Mr Ramesh said the Congress was happy that BJP could be checked in UP.

'' We have not got the number of seats we expected. But we are happy that the BJP has been checked,'' he said.

In reply to a question, Mr Ramesh said the Congress expected the Bahujan Samaj Party(BSP), which swept the polls in UP, to support the ''secular forces''.

The social coalition of the upper caste, dalits and the Muslims that BSP chief Mayawati was leading was the same that remained a vote bank for the Congress for decades. ''But Mayawati has given a new lease of life to this social coalition with the leadership being in the hands of dalits,'' he said.

UNI