HYDERABAD: It might not be easy to get Congress party nomination for the continuous losers during the next polls in the State. According to sources, AICC new president Rahul Gandhi is firm on imposing some strict rules this time in order to ensure that party tickets are given to the winnable candidates only.
As the next Assembly polls will be do-or-die battle for the Congress not just in the State but also across the country, the AICC high command under the guidance of party’s new boss Rahul Gandhi, is learnt to be formulating some guidelines to select party candidates for the next elections in a fool-proof manner.
Denial of party ticket to those who lost the election three times continuously, considering the candidatures of alternative candidates in the place of those who lost the 2014 polls with a margin of more than 35,000 votes and infusing young blood to the party are said to be some key decisions being proposed by the AICC new president.According to sources, while allotting party tickets to the suitable candidates, the party leadership will not only consider the reports of surveys commissioned by the party to gauge the popularity of the respective candidate in each Lok Sabha and Assembly segment, but also gather the views of other senior leaders to know about the acceptability level of the candidate.
“This time a lot of ground work will be done before issuing party tickets to any leader in each Lok Sabha and Assembly segment. There will be a lot of screening before allotting tickets to our party candidates, where other political parties including the ruling TRS, are strong,” a Congress senior leader disclosed.
It is further learnt that the party leadership has been into the exercise of categorising all the Assembly segments into four categories, depending on the party’s electoral strength. This means, segments are being divided into those where party is completely strong, where party can improve its position with some sort of measures, where party has to do a lot of hard work to emerge as a winner and where its winning chances are remote. Hereafter, party leadership’s focus will be on the constituencies.
TPCC deploys workers in 31 constituencies
The TPCC leadership is already taking measures by deploying as many as 1,15,630 workers in 31 reserved Assembly constituencies across the State to regain the confidence of party’s “one-time” traditional voters- STs and SCs, by the 2019 polls. All these workers have been undertaking door-to-door visits in each polling booth and collecting the minute details on the strengths and weaknesses of Congress candidates in the respective constituency, besides gathering information on the weak points of TRS leaders or MLAs in that particular Assembly segment. The party leadership will undertake a similar exercise in other constituencies, where the party has to improve its position at grassroots level, sources informed.
Further, party senior leaders say that Rahul Gandhi also wants to give more tickets to youngsters this time so as to give “young look” to the party in the next polls. Party leaders are of the view that around 40 per cent seats this time might be reserved for young leaders.