Ahead of releasing the first list of candidates for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls, the Congress Central Election Committee (CEC) on Thursday finalised the names of 40 candidates at a meeting chaired by party supremo Mallikarjun Kharge.
It has been reported that a total of 60 Lok Sabha seats from 11 states and union territories were discussed during deliberations at the CEC meeting yesterday including Delhi, Karnataka, Kerala, Chhattisgarh, Telangana, Sikkim, Tripura, Nagaland, Manipur, Meghalaya and Lakshwadeep.
Congress' legislature party leader V D Satheesan said the party will contest 16 seats in Kerala and four will be contested by its allies in the state.
"The CEC has taken a decision as to who are the candidates on the 16 seats. The AICC will announce the names of the candidates tomorrow," Satheesan said.
AICC in-charge Delhi Deepak Babaria said a preliminary discussion took place for Delhi candidates, where the party is contesting three seats while its INDIA bloc ally AAP is contesting the remaining four.
He said a discussion on Delhi seats will be held again on March 11.
Probable Names In The First List
According to PTI, Congress MP Rahul Gandhi will seek re-election from Kerala's Wayanad seat. He may also contest from Amethi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra from Raebareli, a seat which was previously held by Sonia Gandhi. Rahul, who was previously an MP from Amethi, lost the seat in 2019 but won from Wayanad in Kerala.
While former Chhattisgarh chief minister Bhupesh Baghel would be fielded from Rajnandgaon. Former minister Tamradhwaj Sahu is set to fight the elections from the state's Mahasamund seat. Congress general secretary (organisation) K C Venugopal is also among the finalised candidates, the sources said.
Congress MP from Thiruvananthapuram, Shashi Tharoor, is likely to contest the seat again.
In Karnataka, which has a Congress government, candidates on 4-5 seats are yet to be decided by the top brass.
Names For Delhi Seats
The Delhi unit of the grand old party reportedly offered a long list of candidates who were to be considered for the seven Lok Sabha seats. However, the party high command asked them to shortlist some names and come back for the final nod.
According to sources, the names of JP Agrawal, Sandeep Dikshit, and Alka Lamba were discussed for the Chandni Chowk seat. From Northeast Delhi, the names of Arvinder Singh Lovely and Anil Chowdhary have been mentioned while from Northwest Delhi, the names of Rajkumar Chauhan and Udit Raj are being considered.
