Kerala Polls: Congress’s Oommen Chandy to Contest from Puthupally, Muraleedharan from Nemom

Amid fights within the party over fielding certain candidates and multiple sessions of reviewing, the Congress has finally released its list of candidates who will be contesting the 2021 Kerala Assembly election on 6 April. The Congress in Kerala will contest from 92 out of 140 Assembly seats. However, the party has only announced candidates for 86 Assembly seats. The party has fielded 11 female candidates, while 55 percent of the candidates will be new faces.Many senior leaders, who have been contesting for decades, have been kept out of the race for the purpose of introducing new faces. Among the 86 candidates, 27-year-old Aritha Babu will be the youngest candidate of Congress.TN Polls: BJP Releases Candidates List, Khushbu & H Raja in FrayAfter a five-day screening committee meeting and more meetings with the party leadership in Delhi, Kerala Congress Pradesh Committee (KPCC) President Mullappally Ramachandran on Sunday announced the list of candidates for 86 out of 92 seats that the Congress will contest from this election. The party high-command will further deliberate on candidates for six seats namely Kalpetta, Nilambur, Vattiyoorkavu, Kundara, Tavanur and Pattambi and release this list later.The Congress has decided to field party veteran and former CM Oommen Chandy from his home constituency of Puthuppally. This is after Congress cadres protested, and even blocked Oommen Chandy’s car, following reports that he would be fielded from the Nemom seat this time around.Former Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy is one of the few veteran Congress leaders who is contesting this election.Opposition Leader Ramesh Chennithala will also contest from his stronghold of Haripad in Alappuzha.The Nemom constituency in Thiruvananthapuram, one of the most debated seats, has been allotted to a sitting Member of Parliament (MP) from Vadakara, K Muraleedharan. On Friday, the Congress leaders had said that no MPs will be roped in for the election. “Ideally, no MPs should contest in Assembly polls. But, it was critical to have a big candidate for this seat as the fight is against the BJP,” said Mullappally Ramachandran. Hours before the candidate list came out, Muraleedharan spoke to the media, stating that the party leaders were trying to get an exemption from rule that sitting MPs cannot contest in the polls.TN Polls: AMMK’s TTV Dhinakaran to Contest from Kovilpatti The fight for the Nemom constituency would be one of the toughest in the state as both Congress and CPI(M) are vying to wrest the seat from BJP. Nemom is the only constituency of the BJP in Kerala, which is currently held by O Rajagopal. The BJP has fielded Kummanam Rajasekharan for the seat.Incidentally, the Congress leadership had found it particularly tough to pick a candidate for the Nemon constituency. According to reports, the party high-command asked Oommen Chandy and Opposition leader Ramesh Chennithala to come out of their comfort zones in Puthupally and Haripad respectively — and to contest in Nemom. However, both leaders had rejected this. The names of senior leaders K Muraleedharan and Shashi Tharoor were also reportedly considered for Nemom.Introducing its youngest candidate, 27-year-old Aritha Babu, Mullappally Ramachandran said the candidate hails from a marginalised family. “She will dedicate her time to political campaigns. We are proud to have her as our candidate,” he said. Among the other noted women candidates are Padmaja Venugopal who will contest from Thrissur, Shanimol Usman from Aroor and Advocate Bindhu Krishna from Kollam.However, Mahila Congress leaders have slammed the Congress leadership for not allotting sufficient seats for women candidates. Reports had earlier said that at least 20 percent of the seats will be allotted to female candidates.Among the other familiar faces, Congress had fielded film actor Dharmajan from the Scheduled Caste reserved seat in Balussery in Kozhikode district. Notably, local leaders in Balussery had earlier expressed their discontent over fielding Dharmajan, who is not a native of the place.Out of the 86 candidates announced on Sunday, 46 are aged between 25 and 50 years, 22 are aged between 51 and 60 years of age, 15 are aged between 60 and 70 years, while three are above 70 years old.According to Mullappally Ramachandran, KPCC President, 15 of the candidates are undergraduates, 42 are graduates, 12 post-graduates, two Ph.D holders and two are medical practitioners.The candidate for six seats — Kalpetta and Nilambur in Wayanad, Vattiyoorkavu in Thiruvananthapuram and Kundara in Kollam, Thavanoor in Malappuram and Pattambi in Palakkad — will be announced probably by Monday, Mullappally said.Among the constituent parties of the United Democratic Front (UDF), which is led by the Congress, only the Indian Muslim League (IUML) has finalised its list of candidates for 24 seats. They are yet to finalise the candidates for three more seats.UDF has decided to support KK Rema of the Revolutionary Marxist Party (RMP) from Vadakara, if she decides to contest. She is the wife of late RMP leader TP Chandrasekheran, who was earlier with the CPI(M) and was hacked to death in May 2012.List of CandidatesKasaragodUdma - PV BalakrishnanKanhangad - PV SureshPayyannur - M Pradeep KumarKalliasseri* - Bridesh KumarKannurTaliparamba - Abdul Rasheed PVIrikkur - ADV Sajeev JosephKannur - Satheeshan PacheniPeravoor - Advocate Sunny JosephThalassery - MP AravindakshanWayanadMananthavady - PK JayalakshmiSulthanbathery - IC BalakrishnanWandoor - AP Anil KumarKozhikodeBalussery - Dharmajan PKKozhikode North - KSU - KM AbhijithKozhikode SouthBeypore - Adv NiyasKunnamangalamKoduvallyNadapuram - Advocate K Praveen KumarMalappuramPonnani - AM RohitPalakkadThrithala - VT BalramShoranur - T Firoz BabuOttapalam - Dr SalimMalampuzha - SK AnanthakrishnanPalakkad - Shafi ParambilTarur - KA SheebaChittur - Sumesh AchudanAlathur - Palayam PradeepThrissurChelakkara - CC SreekumarKunnamkulam - K JayashankarWadakkanchery - Anil AkkaraManalur - Vijaya HariOllur - Jose VellurThrissur - Padmaja VenugopalNattika - Sunil Lanoor (doubtPudukkad - Anil AnthikadKaipamangalam - Shoba SubinChalakudy - TJ Saneesh KumarKodungallur - MP JacksonErnakulamPerumbavoor - Eldhose KunnappillyAngamaly - Roji M JohnAluva - Anwar SadhathKunnathunad - VP SajeendranParavur - BG SatheeshanVypeen - Deepak JoyKochi - Tonni ChemmaniTripunithura - K BabuErnakulam - TJ VinodThrikkakara - PT ThomasMuvattupuzha - Mathew KoelnaadanIdukkiDevikulam - D KumarUdumbanchola - Adv EM AugustinPeerumade - Cyriac ThomasKottayamVaikom - Dr PR SonaKottayam - Thiruvanchoor RadhakrishnanPuthuppally - Oommen ChandyKanjirappally - Joseph VazhekkanPoonjar - Adv Tomy KallaniTamil Nadu Assembly Elections: Congress Names 21 CandidatesAlappuzhaAroor - Shanimol UsmanCherthala - S SharathAlappuzha - KS ManojAmbalappuzha - Adv M LijuHaripad - Ramesh ChennithalaKayamkulam - Aaritha BabuMavelikkara - KK ShajuChengannur - M ValiKollamKottarakkara - Reshmi RPathanapuram - George Kumar ChamakalaKarunagappally - CR MaheshPathanamthittaRanni - Ringoo CherianAranmula - K Sivadasan NairKonni - Robin PeterAdoor - MG KannanChadayamangalam - MM NaseerKollam - Adv Bindhu KrishnaChathannoor - Peethambara KurupThiruvananthapuramChirayinkeezhu - Anoop BSNedumangad - PS PrasanthVamanapuram - Aanadu JayanAruvikkara - KS SabarinathKattakada - Malayinkeezhu VenugopalKazhakkoottam - Dr SS LalThiruvananthapuram - PS SivakumarNemom - K MuraleedharanParassala - Ansajitha Rasal - doubtKovalam - M VincentNeyyattinkara - R SelvarajVarkala - VRM Shafeer(This story was first published in The News Minute and has been republished with permission)

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Kerala Polls: Congress’ Oommen Chandy to Contest From Puthupally

While the Congress has fielded 11 female candidates, 55 percent of the candidates are new faces.

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Topics: Oomen Chandy Kerala Assembly Elections Congress Party