Even as the ‘A’ and ‘I’ factions are openly slugging it out over Ramesh Chennithala’s Cabinet entry, the ‘A’ group has won an upper hand in the Youth Congress polls.
Dean Kuriakose of ‘A’ group was elected as YC state president while C R Mahesh of ‘I’ faction became the vice-president. Kuriakose of Idukki polled 21,294 votes while Mahesh of Kollam could win 16,486 votes.
The ‘I’ group managed to win four general-secretary posts in the tightly-fought YC polls, the results of which came out here late on Thursday. Chief Minister Oommen Chandy’s son Chandy Oommen was elected as the state secretary.
The newly-elected general secretaries are Adam Mulsi of Kozhikode (I, 1,117 votes); Ifthiquarudeen P M of Malappuram (A, 1,040); Jebi Mather Hisham of Ernakulam (woman reservation A, 371); T G Sunil (fourth group, 635); Aneesh Varikkannamala (A, 751); Leena G of Thiruvananthapuram (I, 206); Vidya Balakrishnan (woman SC/ST reservation I, 209), and S M Balu of Thiruvananthapuram (reservation I, 359).
Though there were minor clashes between activists of ‘A’ and ‘I’ factions at the counting centre here in the morning, counting was done peacefully.
Activists of both factions got together and raised slogans supporting their candidates in the evening. Kuriakose was able to maintain a steady lead from the beginning. Sensing the turn of events, most of the ‘I’ group activists left the counting centre by late evening.
The ‘A’ group had successfully maintained its upper hand in the parliament and assembly committees polls also.
While the ‘A’ group won 15 parliament committees as against 12 last time, the ‘I’ faction had to satisfy itself with only five seats -- Kannur, Thrissur, Alathur, Alappuzha and Vadakara.