Express News Service
NEW DELHI: With a month to go for Assembly polls, the Congress Central Election Committee (CEC) chaired by party president Mallikarjun Kharge held a meeting on Wednesday to select candidates for Rajasthan and MP polls. Though Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot attended the meeting, his former deputy Sachin Pilot was conspicuous by his absence. The desert state will go to polls on November 25.
After the meeting, Kharge said that the party would retain power in Rajasthan on the back of good governance in the state during the last five years. While the top Congress leadership held separate meetings for Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, Rahul Gandhi participated in the Rajasthan CEC but skipped the Madhya Pradesh meeting as he had to leave for Telangana.
Besides Gehlot, Rajasthan CEC was attended by AICC in-charge of state Sukhjinder Randhawa, state president Govind Dotasra, general secretary organisation K C Venugopal, state screening committee chief Gaurav Gogoi, among others. In a post on X, Kharge said, “Savings, relief, growth, protection and upliftment, this is how Rajasthan changed due to good governance of Congress!”
“We are confident that the public will bless us again. Today an important meeting of the Central Election Committee was held on Rajasthan,” he said. Though the party has released the first list of candidates for Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Telangana and Mizoram, Rajasthan list is still pending. Sources attribute the delay to the rift in the Pilot and Gehlot camp over the selection of candidates. A long-running feud between Chief Minister Gehlot and Pilot was resolved recently after the intervention of the top leadership. In 2020, Pilot revolted against Gehlot with his loyals and stayed in BJP-ruled Haryana for a couple of days before returning to his state.
It was learnt that the party may drop several sitting MLAs to beat the anti-incumbency factor. Gehlot has hinted that ‘winnability’ will be the main factor when deciding tickets. The party has also conducted Assembly and Lok Sabha-wise surveys to gauge the anti-incumbency factor and feedback from people on sitting MLAs. While the Congress is looking to buck the revolving door trend in Rajasthan and retain power in Madhya Pradesh, it is seeking to wrest back power from the BJP.
10 MLAs dropped in C’garh list
Congress in its second list of 53 candidates released on Wednesday, dropped 10 sitting MLAs and offered tickets to over 20 new faces for the upcoming Assembly polls in Chhattisgarh. The second list of the Congress has 10 women, 14 scheduled tribe and six scheduled caste candidates as 25 MLAs were renominated by the party. In the first list, the party had declared 30 candidates. Out of 83 seats, 18 sitting
MLAs got tickets. Three ST candidates will contest from the general seat.
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