THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: With shortlisting of the Congress candidates list for Assembly polls proving to be a daunting task, after Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala and KPCC president V M Sudheeran struck different postures even when keen to not precipitate matters, the fate of the final list has gone to the hands of the Congress High Command. Without much changes, the preliminary list itself will be submitted to the screening committee headed by Mallikarjun Kharge, Opposition Leader in the Lok Sabha on Monday evening.
Chandy-Sudheeran-Ramesh troika decided to leave the final choice to the screening committee, after attempting a few minor changes here and there. They were closeted for nearly two and half hours in the morning.
“There were no big changes in the preliminary list. Only a few have been excluded. In some segments, there are only a single name. In other constituencies, there are 3-4 names,” Sudheeran said, after a meeting of the 38 member state Congress election panel held in the evening. Asked whether the KPCC president’s name has been marked for any segment as a contestant, Sudheeran replied in the negative.
The trio will leave the state on Monday afternoon, with a hope that the candidates could be announced latest by April 2. “It will based on the guidelines to be laid by the Congress High Command,” he said. “We have informed the party central screening committee that we are willing for discussions from Monday evening itself,” he said. The leaders will be staying in New Delhi for 3-4 days. The names against each segment were not read out at today’s election panel meeting, the third in the series held here in the past few days. However, the list was laid for examination for all attendees. Permission was sought for presenting the list before the central screening committee, which was granted. “The list to be presented from here comprises names suggested by the DCCs and also on behalf of various other organisations and individuals,” Sudheeran maintained. “The list is for 82 seats, which the Congress had contested last time,” he said, clarifying that the nominees for additional seats will be named once the discussions on seat sharing with all coalition partners are over.
3 CongMen Expelled,1 Suspended
Kozhikode: The KPCC on Saturday expelled three party workers and suspended one for pasting posters against Minister for Welfare of Scheduled Tribes P K Jayalakshmi alleging that the minister has links with the RSS. The expelled are Youth Congress Niyojaka Mandalam president A M Nishanth, youth committee Mananthavady mandalam president C H Suhair and Congress Edavaka Mandalam Committee secretary Erambayil Mustafa. The suspended was Wayanad DCC secretary Sreekanth Pattayan. The order was issued by the KPCC president. Wayanad District Congress Committee president K L Poulose said “the inquiry by the KPCC secretary has found the four of them involved in the incident”.
Waiting list
The Congress list carries the names of all sitting legislators including that of T N Pratapan, who had requested to strike down his name through a letter submitted to the KPCC president.
However, it is understood that the panel has already been sounded by around five Congress MLAs that they are not interested to contest the polls
In addition to Pratapan, those who are most likely to keep out of the fray this time are ministers Aryadan Mohammed and C N Balakrishnan, former minister-speaker Therambil Ramakrishnan and Manalur MLA P A Madhavan