“As our party president has accepted the defeat in most gracious manner, we at INOC (I) also respect the verdict of people of the states voted in the election,” Shudh Parkash Singh, president of the Indian National Overseas Congress (I) USA, said.

“In my opinion, the unprecedented development the UPA brought to India got buried under corruption scandals.  The corruption was always there under BJP rule too. There is no state or party under whose rule corruption is not happening.

“It got exposed at the federal level only because of the transparency brought by congress party with the Right to Information Act. 

“I think the party has also failed to communicate about the achievements of the UPA government. We need to improve our public relations and most certainly work against corruption. No other party in history of India has taken so much action against its own leaders as the Congress party has done. We need to work against corrupt individuals more aggressively. 

“This election has worked as an alarm for us but we don't need to be depressed. Last time several assembly elections went in favor of Congress party. This one went in favor of BJP.

“So its a cycle. We are disappointed but not demoralized. We are sure, people will realize soon and vote for the right party in 2014 general elections,” Singh said.

“The polling results of the just announced state elections are indeed a humbling experience for the Congress Party, however the party is resilient and strong enough to reassess the reasons for the failures and bounce back’ said George Abraham, chairman of INOC (I). ‘We indeed respect the verdict of the people and their voices are heard very loud and clear across the land. However, as it has been suggested by some quarters, this vote at state elections should not be viewed as ‘semi-final’ to the 2014 national election. State elections are mostly driven by local issues and often those results may have very little national implications'.

“These elections once again showed the triumph of a maturing democracy where voter participation has gone up and people are more actively involved in trying to make  a difference.

“It is incumbent upon the Congress Party to reconnect with the grass roots and re-adjust the election strategy, empower the cadre that believes in the true values and principles, distance themselves from vested interests who may be hurting the image and communicate better to the public about so many landmark accomplishments under the UPA rule.

“It is truly a time of introspection and action, the statement continued. “We are grateful to Rahul Gandhi for his statement that ‘the Aam Aadmi Party involved a lot of non-traditional people and we will learn from that...and will better it in a way you cannot imagine.’