Cong finalises few Pb polls candidates, names to be declared

Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and party vice president Rahul Gandhi today discussed the candidates for the upcoming Punjab elections and are learnt to have finalised a few, but the same will be declared later.
Sonia Gandhi chaired a meeting of the party's Central Election Committee, where top party leaders including her political secretary Ahmed Patel, general secretaries Ambika Soni, Janardan Dwivedi, Veerappa Moily and Girija Vyas, were present besides PCC chief Amarinder Singh and AICC in-charge of Punjab affairs Asha Kumari .
The Screening Committee head and former Rajasthan chief minister Ashok Gehlot and AICC secretary and co-incharge of party's Punjab affairs Harish Chaudhary were also present, the sources said.

The meeting that lasted almost three hours saw some disagreements on many seats and another meeting of the CEC is slated this week-end or early next week, they said.
However, the top leadership is learnt to have given its nod on single candidate seats, majority of which include sitting MLAs, whose names were recommended by the Screening Committee.
Congress is striving to get back to power in the high-stakes Punjab Assembly polls slated early next year.