Madhya Pradesh Congress' newly appointed chief Jitu Patwari has said his party, which suffered defeat in the recently held assembly polls, will face the next year's Lok Sabha elections under collective leadership and deliver positive results.

Patwari, 50, who belongs to the Other Backward Classes (OBC) community, was on Saturday appointed as the state Congress chief, replacing party veteran Kamal Nath.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) retained power in the state by winning 163 seats in the 230-member assembly, polls to which were held on November 17. The Congress managed to win 66 seats.

Reacting to his appointment, Patwari, while talking to reporters here on Saturday night, thanked the Congress high command for giving a big responsibility to a "small worker" like him.

"We faced defeat in the recent assembly elections and I am aware that the Congress faces the challenge of putting up a good performance in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections. We will face this challenge on the basis of collective leadership and deliver positive results while taking the Congress' ideology from door-to-door," he said.

To a question, Patwari said it is a natural process and also need of the time on how to increase the participation of youth in the Congress along with the respect for senior leaders.

"Kamal Nath (previous Congress president) is our leader. The Congress will move forward under the collective leadership and guidance of Kamal Nath, Digvijaya Singh and other senior leaders. Factionalism has already ended in the Congress," he said.

The Congress on Saturday appointed former state minister Umang Singhar (48), a tribal, as its legislature party leader and Hemant Katare (38), a Brahmin, as his deputy.

OBCs constitute 48 per cent of the state's population, and the ruling BJP had four CMs from the segment since 2003, namely Uma Bharti, Babulal Gaur, Shivraj Singh Chouhan and incumbent Mohan Yadav, who was sworn in on December 13.

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