Congress to finalise candidates for Kerala Assembly polls soon

The Congress is apparently planning to have an early bird advantage in the upcoming Assembly polls in Kerala by finalising its candidates much ahead of the declaration of the election schedule.

The party has already started bilateral talks for the purpose and the first list could be out by January-end. This is among the main points in the action plan conceived at the two-day ‘Lakshya 2026’ State leadership camp that concluded at Sulthan Bathery in Wayanad on Monday. Leader of the Opposition V.D. Satheesan presented the action plan before the delegates, prepared in consultation with poll strategist Sunil Kanugolu.

According to party sources, the All India Congress Committee’s four-member screening committee led by Madhusudan Mistry is likely to visit the State soon. The State-level screening committee will hold talks with its members to zero in on probable candidates. The party had followed the suggestions of its booth-level committees while picking candidates for the local body polls, and declared their names quite early, which reportedly brought it rich electoral dividends. Continuing the same strategy, the proposals of the District Congress Committees alone will be considered for party nominees in the Assembly polls. Discussions will also be held with other constituents in the United Democratic Front (UDF), the sources say. Congress members who were recently elected to the local bodies will be asked to be active in the Assembly poll campaign.

The Congress is also planning to improve the UDF’s performance in districts such as Malappuram and Ernakulam, where it has a strong presence, and Kozhikode and Pathanamthitta, where its electoral presence has been relatively weak in recent years. The UDF had made impressive gains in these districts in the local body polls. The target is to achieve at least 100 Assembly seats for the front, the sources say.

Main campaign theme

A delegate at the camp told The Hindu on Monday that the Sabarimala gold theft case would be the main campaign theme in the Assembly election. Corruption in governance, the lack of new development initiatives, and the irregularities in the ongoing Special Intensive Revision of the electoral rolls would be some of the other issues, he added. The Congress believes that there is a strong anti-incumbency feeling against the LDF government, which could be exploited in the campaign.

Addressing the delegates, Mr. Satheesan said that “miracles” would happen ahead of the Assembly polls and some of the constituents of the LDF and the National Democratic Alliance would be part of the UDF. He claimed that the UDF’s base had already been widened by including influencers and opinion makers from various quarters. Mr. Satheesan also sought to present the feel of a united house, claiming that a “team UDF” would face the election. He dismissed the media reports about the Congress struggling with a large number of chief ministerial aspirants, saying it was a “CPI(M) narrative”.

Sunny Joseph, Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president, meanwhile, said that the results of the local body polls was not a “one-time judgment” by the voters and it could continue in the Assembly polls as well.