Thiruvananthapuram: The Congress has almost finalised the list of its candidates following the talks held by KPCC president Mullapally Ramachandran, Opposition Leader Ramesh Chennithala and CWC member Oommen Chandy at Indira Bhavan here late on Monday night, it is learnt. However, the names will be announced only after approval by the AICC.
The KPCC may include Pathanamthitta sitting MP Anto Antony in the list though the DCC had rejected him. A DCC leader from Pathanamt-hitta said the KPCC and AICC were free to make their choice.
The three leaders discussed the candidates for seats other than the sitting ones.
The probable candidates are: Attingal (sitting Konni MLA Adoor Prakash), Idukki (Jos-eph Vazhakkan), Chala-kudy (Benny Behanan or an Ezhava candidate), Thrissur (Jose Valoor, Shaji Kodankandath, Rajendran Arangath, M. P. Jackson, C. I. Se-bastian, Dr. Niji Justin), Al-athur (C. C. Sreekumar, K. V. Dasan, N. K. Sud-hir, Sunil Laloor, K. C. Subramanian, K. B. Sas-ikumar, Sreelal Sudhir and M. V. Suresh), Pa-lakkad (V. K. Sreekand-an, Sumesh Achuthan), Wayanad (M. M. Hassan, K. Muraleedharan, Sha-nimol Usman, T. Siddiq-ue), Kannur (K. Sudhak-aran) and Kasaragod (Balakrishnan Periya, Jebi Mather). If Sudh-akaran is fielded from Kannur, Balakrishnan may not get a chance in Kasaragod as two Ezhava candidates will not be fielded from neighbouring constituencies.
Vatakara sitting MP Mullapally is keen on fielding K. M. Abhijith, KSU president, from there. Out of the 20 Lok Sabha seats in the state, the Congress usually co-ntests 16 seats, Muslim League two and Kerala Congress (Mani) and Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) one each.
