Telangana Congress may release first list of candidates in early November
Congress leaders said some 70 names will be announced inearlyNovember and will include some 40 former cabinet ministers
Hyderabad: After days of suspense, the Congress in Telangana is all set to release its first list of candidates for the upcoming state elections.
Senior leaders from the party said about 70 names will be announced in the first week of November, which will include names of about 40 former cabinet ministers. The party is also strictly following the one family-one ticket rule in the coming polls.
The finalization of names also means that the Congress-led grand alliance, which includes the Telugu Desam Party (TDP), Communist Party of India (CPI) and the Telangana Jana Samithi (TJS), has finally settled the issue of seat-sharing for the elections. A Telangana Congress Pradesh Committee (TPCC) leader, who did not want to be named, said that between 20 to 25 of the 119 Assembly seats will go to alliance partners.
The buzz in political circles earlier was that the seat-sharing discussions were dragging on over the TJS’s demand for a greater share. However, TJS president M. Kodandaram said last week that the issue had been resolved and that the TJS is not asking for any more than what is on offer.
“In fact, this time even former MPs or heavyweights who contested the 2014 Lok Sabha elections will be candidates in the Assembly polls, because the party wants to ensure victory at any cost," said the TPCC leader mentioned above.
The Congress-led grand alliance is looking to trounce the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) led by caretaker chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, which won 63 of the 119 seats in the 2014 state polls.
Rao advanced elections to this year from 2019, dissolving the Assembly on 6 September.
TPCC secretary M. Vikram Goud said that all issues between the alliance partners have been ironed out and that the Congress will announce the candidate list soon. “We are confident of winning the elections. There is a lot of anti-incumbency against the TRS," he added.
Political analyst Palwai Raghavendra Reddy, however, was of the view that the Congress has left the release of its candidates’ list till too late. “We are in the second week of October, and there is no point in waiting. People might say it is a tactical move, but I don’t think the issues with TJS have been resolved yet. The Congress could have at least announced its first list," he said.
Reddy also said the Congress’s policy of issuing one ticket per family might not be feasible, given the number of state-level political dynasties in the party.
“We have to see how that works, because even the TPCC president’s (N. Uttam Kumar Reddy) family itself is believed to have two tickets this time," he said.
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