By Our Reporter
SHILLONG: Gearing up for elections to the 60-member State assembly due early next year, the State Election Committee (SEC) of Meghalaya Pradesh Congress Committee has shortlisted 46 names for as many constituencies to be recommended to the party’s central election committee (CEC) for approval.
For the remaining 14 constituencies, the SEC has constituted a two-member panel to finalise names for the 8 constituencies, while at the same time it has decided to keep in abeyance decision on other six constituencies.
Out of these six constituencies, sources said there are four constituencies where the party is planning to allot the tickets to Independent MLAs who are currently supporting Congress-led MUA Government.
The four Independent MLAs who are supporting the MUA Government are Mawprem legislator Manas Chaudhuri, Power Minister AT Mondal (Phulbari), Rongram legislator Ismail R Marak and Tikrikilla MLA Limison D Sangma. All the four are associate members of the Congress Legislature Party.
Sources, however, refused to divulge the details regarding remaining two constituencies.
The shortlisting of candidates was done during the meeting of the SEC in the presence of AICC observers D. Shandil and Sanjay Bhapna here on Wednesday.
The committee scrutinized the applications of more than 140 ticket aspirants.
Breaking convention, it was Chief Minister Dr Mukul Sangma who informed media the decisions taken by the SEC instead of the AICC leaders or even the MPCC chief DD Lapang, who is also the chairman of the SEC.
Dr Sangma said the SEC carried out a detailed scrutiny of the ticket aspirants.
“Our exercise is limited to analyzing, assessing and adopting certain parameters which actually revolves around the winnability of the candidates, besides other aspects,” Dr Sangma said. “The consensus on 46 names is an indication that the whole process was carried out in a cordial manner,” he said adding that the final list would be placed before the Central Screening Committee led by Shandil.
“After scrutinizing the details of the potential candidates, the screening committee would submit a list of candidates for the 60 Assembly constituencies to the party high command. The announcement of the party candidates would be made only after the final approval from the AICC president Sonia Gandhi,” Dr Sangma said.
According to Chief Minister, the party would announce the list at the right time to give the candidates appropriate time to prepare for the elections. When asked how the party would ensure that all those ticket aspirants who were denied the tickets do not revolt against the party official candidate, the Chief Minister said that the party has an inherent mechanism to handle such situation.
“I do not foresee any such situation,” he asserted.
When asked how many sitting legislators would not be given tickets, Dr Sangma said such things cannot be disclosed at the moment. The Chief Minister also refused to divulge the names of the six constituencies of which decision has been kept pending. Later, Shandil said that the party was looking to field those candidates who could serve people better. According to him, the party leadership is very much happy with the performance of Dr Sangma.