Telangana Congress Candidates Not Finalized Yet

Stating that there was no truth to the news reports that the list of Congress candidates for the December 7 Telangana Assembly elections was finalised, Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) president N Uttam Kumar Reddy today clarified that the list submitted to the party high command was under active consideration, and could be approved on Friday.

The TPCC chief appealed to the party activists and leaders, especially those aspiring for tickets, to remain calm and not to give any credence to the reports.

Reddy's appeal comes in the wake of protests at Gandhi Bhavan in Hyderabad, the Congress headquarters for Telangana, by some ticket aspirants, and some others taking the battle to New Delhi to agitate outside the AICC office where party leaders were grappling to finalize the list of candidates and the final seat-sharing formula with the TDP, the TJS and the CPI.

The TPCC president is currently in New Delhi to discuss the candidate selection with the Congress high command. He said that consultations and discussions to decide the final list of candidates were still ongoing.

Meanwhile, the Chairman of the Congress Screening Committee for Telangana, Bakthacharan Das, and Sharmista Mukherjee met with the protesting ticket aspirants at Gandhi Bhavan. They met Palvai Sravanthi who is expecting the ticket for the Munugodu seat, Premsagar Rao who is expecting the ticket for Mancheriyal, and Chandrasekhar who is expecting the ticket for the Vikarabad seat, and urged them to work for the victory of the Congress in the upcoming elections and promised them prominent posts like Legislative Council memberships (i. e. MLC positions) or nominated Chairman posts of corporations if the party came to power.

Other ticket aspirants who also met with the screening committee members include Manemma (Nagarkurnool), Dhanamma (Nakrekal), Obaidulla Kotwal (Mahbubnagar), Addanki Dayakar (Thungaturti), Patel Ramesh Reddy and former minister R Damodar Reddy (Suryapet), Arvind Reddy (Mancheriyal), Vanama Venkateswar Rao (Kothagudem) and Haripriya (Yellandu).