Earlier, the 57-year-old leader had said “I will agree with whatever responsibility my party will give me. Today the name of the Chief Minister will be announced by PL Punia and Mallikarjun Kharge. We will fulfil the promises made to the people of Chhattisgarh”
Belying predictions of exit polls, the Congress won convincingly in Chattisgarh a two-third majority. The victory ended the 15-year rule of the Raman Singh-led Bharatiya Janata Party government. It won 68 seats in the 90-member Assembly, far more than the 46 required to form the government, while the BJP got only 15 seats. After the result, BJP’s Raman Singh submitted his resignation to Governor Anandiben Patel and said he accepts responsibility for BJP's poor showing.
Former Congress president Sonia Gandhi described the party's good showing in the Hindi heartland states as a victory over the BJP's "negative politics".
The Congress on Friday named Ashok Gehlot Rajasthan's next chief minister after several rounds of discussions lasting more than two days. In Madhya Pradesh, Congress leader Kamal Nath was announced as chief minister-designate on December 13.
Gandhi held several rounds of discussion since Saturday morning with the four aspirants for the post--T S Singh Deo, Tamradhwaj Sahu, Bhupesh Baghel and Charan Das Mahant--at his Tughlaq Lane residence in New Delhi. The Congress president had tweeted a smiling picture of all the four aspirants for the Chhattisgarh CM's post along with a quote by Reid Hoffman. "No matter how brilliant your mind or strategy, if you're playing a solo game, you'll always lose out to a team.- Reid Hoffman," he tweeted.