Raipur, Oct 5 (IANS): Unity among state Congress leaders is the need of the hour if the party genuinely wants to take on the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Chhattisgarh, former state chief minister Ajit Jogi's son said Friday.

Talking to IANS, Amit Jogi, a state Congress leader, attributed the party's defeat in the 2003 and 2008 assembly elections to the lack of coordination among Congress leaders. He also blamed the machinations of the BJP-led state government, which used the Maoist insurgency in Bastar to rig polls.

In both 2003 and 2008 assembly elections, the Congress lost a majority of seats in Bastar region, a decisive factor in its failure to form the government in Chhattisgarh though the tribal sections have been a traditional vote bank of the party.

Quoting Benjamin Franklin's historic statement, "We must, indeed, all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately," Amit Jogi said that if the party failed to fight unitedly, there was no way to stop the BJP from forming the government for the third term.

Amit Jogi said his ultimate fight is against the corrupt BJP regime and not against any Congress leader.

On the recent outcry over the move to nominate him as a general secretary of the state Congress, which was later scuttled, Amit Jogi said: "The outburst of senior leaders on the issue was perplexing and against the spirit of unity."

"I'm active in state for the last 10 years, raising the plight of people directly before the central leadership of the party. For the last two and a half years I have been working on issues plaguing the society. These are the issues which are of paramount importance to me, not any post in the state Congress," he added.