Delhi polls: Congress panel fails to choose candidates

The second meeting of the Congress election committee remained inconclusive as it failed to decide any candidate for the Delhi assembly elections scheduled for Dec 4.

With nearly 1,600 applicants scrambling for Congress tickets for elections to the 70-seat Delhi assembly, various groups in the party, including supporters of Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit and state Congress chief J.P. Agarwal, are lobbying hard.

Though issues like criminal records and qualification of ticket seekers were discussed at the Congress election committee, there was discord among the members while trying to choose clean candidates, party sources said.

Some members expressed their reservations about two MLAs - Asif Mohammad and Ram Singh, who joined the Congress from other parties - likely to be given the tickets.

While Asif Mohammad is an MLA from Okhla, Ram Singh is a lawmaker from the Badarpur constituency.

"Asif and Ram Singh have just joined the party but it does not mean they will get tickets because they are sitting MLAs. The party should prefer its own candidate," said a Congress member after the meeting.

Interestingly, the issue of several election committee members seeking party tickets for themselves or their relatives was discussed in the meeting.

According to sources, of the 27 members of the election committee, 17 have sought party tickets either for themselves or their relatives, a party insider said.

There will be another meeting of the election committee Oct 14.

While the winning factor will come into play for deciding candidates, the Congress has said it would not give tickets to candidates with criminal records.

Congress party communications chief Ajay Maken and Communications Minister Kapil Sibal - both committee members - were not present at Friday's meeting.

The election committee is headed by Pradesh Congress Committee chief J.P. Agarwal and has Dikshit as its member.