On December 13, three days before the last phase of polling, amid an unending stream of visitors to Rajiv Gandhi Bhavan — the state Congress headquarters in Ahmedabad — top party leaders talked of a “silent surge” that would push the party beyond the magic figure of 92.

They cited Sonia Gandhi’s rallies and Narendra Modi’s reaction — on Sohrabuddin and Afzal Guru — to argue that Modi was getting desperate. “Just wait until December 23 evening,” said a top Congress leader parked in the state for weeks.

This evening, however, the first knives were being brought out in the Congress.

And the Left wasn’t lending its shoulder to the Congress to cry on — instead, it talked of the Congress’s “need to introspect,” its failure to counter communalism and even rubbed it in underlining its opposition to the nuclear deal and “right-wing economics.”

No wonder then that the Congress response today — both at the Centre and in the state — was one of silence.

Spokespersons who trotted to TV studios took the easy way out: Modi (read a divided Gujarat) was the only reason why the party lost.

But as party president Sonia Gandhi is set to call a meeting of her top leaders tomorrow, the blame game has begun. General Secretary Digvijay Singh blamed the “local leadership,” seen as a not-so veiled swipe at Ahmed Patel, political secretary to the Congress president.

However, few Congress leaders were vocal today aware that it was Sonia who dominated the election campaign. So although Union Minister Shankarsinh Vaghela admitted that “excessive reaction” to her “merchant-of-death remark” could have helped the BJP, others stood by that line.

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