THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: KPCC president V. M. Sudheeran has said that only winnable candidates will be fielded in the Assembly elections. The KPCC leadership will be heading to New Delhi to hold talks with AICC leaders on the candidature on Monday.
At the two-hour long KPCC executive meeting held here at the KPCC office, a section of leaders demanded that those leaders who had been in the fray more than three times should be kept out.
Mr Sudheeran as well as Chief Minister Oommen Chandy intervened and said that winnability was the crucial criterion.
“The AICC leadership has called Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, home minister Ramesh Chennithala and myself to start the pre-poll discussions,” said Mr Sudheeran to reporters here after the two-day state meeting of the party leadership.
He also said that several suggestions were discussed on how to go about candidate selection and a final picture would emerge once they returned from Delhi. Discussions with the allies on seat sharing would also be initiated after the KPCC leadership returns from New Delhi.
A majority of leaders have demanded that candidature should not be fixed as per group equations and enough prominence should be given to youth and women leaders.
However, Mr Sudheeran remained tightlipped on whether he would be contesting in the elections or not. He also said that the party-appointed committee under the banner of senior Congress leader Vakkom Purushothaman, that probed allegations of certain party members playing truant at the 2011 assembly polls, would be looked into when the candidate selections were done.
Apart from Vakkom, Late A. C. Jose and V. S. Vijayaraghavan were the other committee members who probed the allegations that were raised after the last Assembly elections.
Vakkom had alleged that no action was taken against those erring leaders who had played a negative role despite naming them in the three-member committee report. He said that since those leaders were prominent group leaders, they went scotfree.
