Karnataka Congress chief DK Shivakumar said that the Congress will be releasing its second list of candidates for the Assembly elections scheduled in the State, as reported by the news agency ANI. The party's Central Election Committee will meet again today and the names of the candidates will be announced post-meeting, Shivakumar said on Wednesday.
Talking to media persons, Shivakumar said, "(CEC) will meet again tomorrow. We are finalising it and a list will be announced at the earliest", as quoted by ANI. Although the party has announced candidates for 124 seats it is yet to name them for the remaining 100 seats.
Earlier on Tuesday, Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge said that the party would conduct an extensive discussion on candidates for the remaining 100 seats in the State. The Congress had on March 25 announced its first list of 124 candidates for the polls, which included names of former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and State Party president DK Shivakumar.
Elections are slated to be held in Karnataka in a single phase on May 10, and the counting of votes will take place on May 13. Siddaramaiah will be contesting from the Varuna constituency while DK Shivakumar would be the candidate from Kanakapura.
Siddaramaiah had expressed his interest in contesting from the Kolar constituency but the Congress High Command instructed him to drop the plan following disagreements between the party's local leaders in the constituency. The party has fielded M Roopakala from the Kolar Gold Field constituency, as reported by ANI.
A large number of Congress workers had staged protests outside the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee office in Bengaluru on Monday and Tuesday seeking tickets for their leaders to contest in the polls.
Karnataka, which has 224 seats in the Assembly currently has 119 MLAs of the ruling BJP, while Congress has 75 and its ally JD(S) has 28 seats. Political parties in the State including the ruling BJP, Congress, and ally JD(S) are engaged in a spate of allegations and counter-allegations, with the latter attempting to corner the government over the issue of corruption.
Earlier on Tuesday, the Congress Central Election Committee meeting regarding the upcoming Karnataka Assembly Elections was held at the AICC office in Delhi.
Before the meeting, Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge spoke to media persons about the meeting and said that the committee will unanimously decide and choose candidates who can win or at least give competition to other parties. There are a total of 5.21 crores in the state and the number of 100-plus voters is 16,976. He informed that over 58,000 polling stations would be set up across the state.