Pressure to declare the list of candidates for the ensuing Assembly polls is growing in Chhattisgarh Congress as also the clamour for party tickets, even as senior leaders of Chhattisgarh Pradesh Congress Committee held a meeting with party’s screening committee chairman C P Joshi in New Delhi on Sunday in which senior leader of Chhattisgarh and All India Congress Committee Treasurer Motilal Vora was also present.
Notably, seeing the growing demand for declaration of candidates at the earliest, CGPCC President Charandas Mahant and State Congress legislature party leader Ravindra Choubey had left for Delhi Saturday evening and held a meeting with the poll screening committee chairman CP Joshi in their bid to expedite the process of selection. The meeting was also attended by AICC General Secretary and Chhattisgarh in-charge B K Hariprasad among others.
According to party sources, meeting of the screening committee will also be held on Monday in which at least 45-50 names of candidates are likely to be finalised and would be sent to the party high command for final approval. According to sources, former chief Minister Ajit Jogi is camping in Delhi for nearly a fortnight along with a dozen of his supporters.
He has already submitted a list of favourite ticket seekers directly to the screening committee chief C P Joshi and keenly watching the development in Delhi. His belligerent mood clearly left the hint that if the high command tried to sideline him he would not even hesitate to part his ways. He is scheduled to return to State capital on September 18 after knowing the conclusion of Monday’s meet.
In this situation, pressure has started building up among the establishment faction members also as many of them believed that at least 40 percent of the Assembly seats would go to Jogi and his supporters. And since the former chief Minister is eyeing seats of Bilaspur division and Raipur division (which also included the newly formed Durg division), candidature of many heavy weights seemed in danger, specially those who lost the elections last time.
Smelling the danger ahead, demand for declaring the list of candidates has increased in party circles back at home amid growing clamour for tickets by large number of aspirants. On their part, the rival aspirants claimed that only due to declaration of the names of candidates in the eleventh hour the party suffered losses on three seats of Raipur, as well as Beltara, Bhatgaon and Dharsiwan seats of Bilaspur district.
Rising tension, out of the thought of ‘may lose the race for ticket’, was also palpable when a group of Congress men from Dhamtari openly threatened in front of Union Minister Jairam Ramesh, B K Haripradsad and Mahant on Saturday in Raipur, not to work for the party if ticket is given to sitting MlA Gurmukh Singh Hora.
Defiance against some other sitting members including Sihawa MlA Ambika Markam has also come in to open despite the party’s stand for fielding the sitting MlAs in the ensuing Assembly polls.