Rampant group wars and allegations of corruption and moral turpitude against several sitting MPs are making the efforts of Kerala’s Congress party for finalising its list of candidates for the lok Sabha election difficult even as its allies in the ruling UDF have already drawn up their poll plans and finalised their candidates.
The Congress leadership in Kerala is also confused over the demand of the allies for more seats than they had been contesting in the past and this fact was evident in the statement of State Congress president Ramesh Chennithala in Delhi on Tuesday that a final decision on whether his party would contest in 17 of the 20 seats in the State had not yet been taken.
Chennithala indicated that the Congress had not been able to form even a preliminary idea on the candidates for the lS polls. The party high command has asked the PCCs to submit their candidate lists within “no time” as per a decision taken at the Jaipur AICC meet. “The instruction is to prepare the list at the earliest,” Chennithala said.
The Indian Union Muslim league, second biggest constituent of the UDF, has already decided to field its sitting MPs Union Minister E Ahamed and ET Muhammad Basheer, Sate party general secretary, respectively in the Malappuram and Ponnani constituencies
which they presently represent. The Muslim league has been contesting two seats in Kerala traditionally.
Ahamed, who was elected to the lok Sabha for the sixth consecutive term in 2009, has already informed State Muslim league president Panakkad Hyderali Shihab Thangal about his intention to contest from Malappuram. Sources say the party may field former Rajya Sabha member and industrialist PV Abdul Wahab if the Congress and UDF accept its demand for a third seat.
Kerala Congress (M), third biggest constituent of the UDF, will field sitting MP Jose K Mani, son of State Finance Minister KM Mani, in the Kottayam constituency he presently represents. However, the KC(M) is likely to give a tough time for the Congress during the seat-sharing talks as a section in it is adamant on getting one more seat, Idukki, to contest.
Though the UDF is a nine-party alliance, no other party than these three has been contesting lok Sabha polls. In the 2009 election, the Congress had won 13 of the 17 seats it had contested. However, Congress leaders are now secretly admitting that it will be impossible for the party repeat that performance this time.