The Congress has started selection process for lok Sabha candidates in the State. The State election committee meeting will be held at Delhi on Saturday. The panel of names of probable candidates could be prepared at the meeting.
All the senior leaders of the State Congress are camping in Delhi to attend the AICC meeting. The election committee meeting has been convened in the morning. Besides, State in-charge BK Hariprasad, screening committee member Meenakshi Natarajan is expected to be present in the meeting. The State Congress president Bhupesh Baghel and leader of Opposition TS Singhdeo have prepared the list of claimants of all the 11 lok Sabha seats. They will produce the list before the election committee meeting.
It is said that recently both the leaders had a meeting with the central election committee member Madhusudan Mistri. Guidelines have been issued in the meeting for the selection of candidates. Based on the guidelines, panel of candidates could be prepared in the election committee. During the meeting with the state president and the leader of the opposition, several leaders had given suggestions not to make defeated leaders and MlAs lok Sabha candidates. However, discussion could be held on this point.
According to sources, meeting of the Central Election Committee could be held before January 31. The State election committee would make all the exercises about the candidates before the meeting. It is considered that the high command is in favour of declaring the candidates as early as possible and it could be declared in the first or second week of February, the sources added.