Congress holds CEC meet, picks candidates for 9 West Bengal seats
New Delhi, March 19
The Congress is expected to release its third list of candidates for the Lok Sabha elections on Wednesday. Its Central Election Committee (CEC) met here on Tuesday under the chairmanship of party president Mallikarjun Kharge.
The party finalised candidates for nine West Bengal seats where it is set to contest 12 constituencies even as negotiations with its Left Front allies regarding three seats (Basirhat, Barasat and Purulia) have remained inconclusive. The Chandigarh seat also featured in the CEC meeting. Anandpur Sahib MP Manish Tewari, party’s city chief HS Lucky and former Union minister Pawan Bansal are in the contention.
The CEC also discussed candidate selection for Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh. Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah, who was present at the meeting, told mediapersons that the names would be announced on Wednesday.
The Congress has already named candidates for seven of the 28 Karnataka seats. In case of Madhya Pradesh, the Congress has announced the names of 10 candidates.
Meanwhile, stating that the country was looking forward for a change, Kharge said the “guarantees” promised by the present government would meet the same fate as the “India Shining” slogan of the BJP in 2004. The party chief was speaking at a meeting of the Congress Working Committee (CWC) here.
