Staff Reporter
Congress party today released its first list of 39 candidates for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections and Rahul Gandhi has been fielded from the Wayanad seat in Kerala.
Former Chhattisgarh chief minister Bhupesh Baghel from Rajnandgaon, and Rahul’s closest aide and AICC general secretary organisation KC Venugopal from Alappuzha in the first list of 39 candidates.
61% SC/ST/OBC/Minority
31% Below the age of 50 years
52% Below the age of 60 years
The maiden Congress list also features former union minister Tamradhwaj Sahu from Mahasamund (Chhattisgarh); Karnataka deputy chief minister DK Shivakumar’s brother and sitting MP DK Suresh from Bangalore Rural; Kerala Congress chief K Sudhakaran from Kannur in Kerala.
Three-term sitting MP from Thiruvananthapuram Shashi Tharoor will again defend his seat, and has been pitched opposite BJP’s Rajeev Chandrashekhar, MoS, Electronics and IT.
The Congress Central Election Committee had discussed 60 seats across 11 states on Thursday night and was able to form a consensus on only 39.
The next CEC meeting will be held on March 11.
In Karnataka, which has a Congress government, seven candidates were announced. These included HR Algur Raju from Bijapur, Anandaswamy Gaddadevara Ma from Haveri, Geetha Shivarajkumar from Shimoga, M Shreyas Patel from Hassan, SP Muddahanumegowda from Tumkur, Venkataramegowda from Mandya and DK Suresh from Bangalore Rural.
Asked if Wayanad was the only seat Rahul would contest, Venugopal, who declared the list, was silent.