New Delhi: The Congress is facing a rush of ticket seekers in poll-bound Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Telangana and has intensified surveys to identify the most suitable candidates in the respective states. According to party leaders, the names that will be shortlisted by the state units based on these field surveys will soon be scrutinized by the respective screening committees and will then be forwarded to the Central Election Committee for final approval.
The Congress, which is campaigning in the four states aggressively, plans to announce the first list of candidates in Madhya Pradesh and Telangana, where the party is in Opposition in September.
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Out of the four states, the Congress is in a direct fight with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in three states - Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh. The Congress is in power in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh. In Telangana, Congress fights the ruling Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS).
On August 18 the BJP tweaked its strategy and announced its first list of 21/90 names in Congress-ruled Chhattisgarh and 39/230 names in Madhya Pradesh, where the grand old party was attacking the ruling BJP aggressively. A day after the BJP's move, the Congress held a meeting of the political affairs committee for Chhattisgarh on August 19 to discuss the selection of candidates, among other things.
“The party is strong and the government has delivered on most of the poll promises. We are confident of winning 75/90 seats this time,” All India Congress Committee (AICC) secretary in-charge of Chhattisgarh Saptagiri Ulaka told ETV Bharat. “Surveys to identify potential candidates are going on,” he said.
The political affairs committees for Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Telangana have already met over the past week to discuss the selection of candidates.
"The focus is on winnability. There is a rush of ticket seekers as they see Congress is on a comeback trail. A lot of surveys are going on in the state. Some are being carried out by the state unit, some by the ticket aspirants but the one being conducted by Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) chief Kamal Nath alone will carry weight. We plan to announce the first list in September which will mostly cover the difficult seats the party has not been winning for long,” senior Madhya Pradesh Congress leader Shobha Oza said.
In Rajasthan, the AICC managers have received a suggestion from a section of the workers that MLAs, who are suffering from anti-incumbency, should not be given tickets this time. To deal with this problem, the three AICC secretaries in charge of the state - Qazi Nizamuddin, Virendra Rathore and Amrita Dhawan - have toured across the constituencies over the past weeks to get a feel of the situation on the ground.
“Various surveys to assess the ground situation including the potential candidates are going on. The only criterion is winnability,” Qazi Nizamuddin said.
In Telangana, the Congress has started taking applications from the ticket aspirants, who have to pay a fee of Rs 50,000. However, the fee is Rs 25,000 for aspirants belonging to the SC/ST category. “There is a rush of aspirants. The idea behind the fee is to get applications only from serious candidates. A lot of surveys are being conducted to identify the potential candidates,” AICC in-charge of Telangana Manikrao Thakre said.
