Bansal in, Cong keeps Pune open

In Karnataka too, the president of the state Youth Congress president, Rizwan Arshad, has been fielded from Bangalore Central.

The Congress today picked winnability over perception as it released its second list of candidates for the LS polls. The party renominated Pawan Kumar Bansal from Chandigarh and Subodh Kant Sahai from Ranchi while it significantly remained undecided about its candidates from Pune and Nanded. The party fielded former Uttar Pradesh chief Rita Bahuguna Joshi from Lucknow, where BJP chief Rajnath Singh is tipped to enter the fray.

Sources said Even as the Congress declared seven other candidates from Maharashtra, it seems to have developed cold feet over fielding the wives of Suresh Kalmadi, the sitting MP, and Ashok Chavan from Pune and Nanded respectively.

The Congress has fielded Petroleum Minister M Veerappa Moily from his Chikkballapur seat. When he was not named in the first list of 194 candidates, it surprised many as the party had renominated all its other sitting MPs in Karnataka.

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Bansal had to resign as railway minister last year after his nephew Vijay Singla was arrested by the CBI for allegedly accepting a bribe of Rs 90 lakh for helping in the promotion of a Railway Board member, while Sahai had resigned ahead of a cabinet reshuffle in 2012. His name had also cropped up in the coal block allocation controversy.

Though the second list did not have any names from Punjab, sources said Union I&B Minister Manish Tewari is set to contest from his Ludhiana seat.

Thursday’s list of 71 candidates also has an element of glamour with film star Nagma being fielded from Meerut and Congress spokesperson Raj Babbar from Ghaziabad. Interestingly, the list does not mention former cricketer Mohd Azharuddin (sitting MP from Moradabad) although his seat has been given to Begum Noor Bano. Azharuddin had declared his intention to move out of Uttar Pradesh.

The Congress has renominated many of its Union ministers. Among them are V Narayanasamy (Puducherry), K V Thomas (Ernakulam), Shashi Tharoor (Thiruvananthapuram), Mullapally Ramachandran (Vadakara) and K C Venugopal (Alappuzha). Congress spokesperson P C Chacko, who headed the JPC which looked into 2G spectrum allocation, has been shifted from Thrissur to neighbouring Chalakudy. In a swap, K P Dhanapalan, who won from Chalakudy in 2009, has been moved to Thrissur. The All India Mahila Congress vice-president Bindu Krishna will be the party’s candidate from Attingal.

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P T Thomas, who had drawn the ire of the Catholic church in the Christian-dominated Idukki over the Kasturirangan report on Western Ghats, failed to get a re-nomination and has been replaced by Kerala State Youth Congress president Dean Kuriakose.

Youth Congress president Rajeev Satav has been fielded from Hingoli in Maharashtra. The Congress’s bid to secure the seat for Satav, considered close to Rahul Gandhi, had created tensions with ally NCP. Satav wanted to contest from Hingoli and the Congress then mounted pressure on the NCP to swap the Hingoli seat, which was in the NCP quota, with Jalna.

In Karnataka too, the president of the state Youth Congress president, Rizwan Arshad, has been fielded from Bangalore Central.

The party has denied tickets to three MPs in the second list. In Mandla in Madhya Pradesh, it has replaced Basori Singh Masram with Omkar Markam.

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In Maharashtra, Bhiwandi MP Suresh Taware has been replaced with Kunbi Sena chief Vishwanath Patil, and Gadchiroli-Chimur MP Marotrao Kowase has been dropped for local MLA Namdeo Usendi.

Pratibha Singh, the wife of Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, has been renominated from Mandi while Hamidullah Sayeed has been renominated from Lakshadweep.