After keeping all waiting, the main opposition Congress and its ally TDP in Telangana on Monday released their first lists of candidates for the December 7 assembly elections.
Both constituents of ‘Mahakutami’ or the grand alliance announced their candidates late on Monday.
While Congress released a list of 65 candidates, the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) named nine.
Congress’ state party chief N Uttam Kumar Reddy will contest from the Huzurnagar constituency, while his wife Padmavati Reddy would again contest from Kodad.
The total number of assembly segments in the state is 119.
The candidates announced by the TDP include — Nama Nageswara Rao (Khammam assembly constituency), Revuri Prakash Reddy (Warangal West), S Venkata Veeraiah (Sattupalli), Kothakota Dayakar Reddy (Maktal), Erra Sekhar (Mahabubnagar), T Veerender Goud (Uppal), Bhavya Anand Prasad (Serilingampalli), Machha Nageswara Rao (Aswaraopet) and Muzaffar Ali Khan (Malakpet), according to a TDP media release issued Monday midnight.
The list of Congress was released after a marathon meeting of the party’s Central Election Committee (CEC) chaired by party president Rahul Gandhi. All state Congress leaders were present at the meeting.
Congress is seeking to upstage K Chandrashekar Rao-led Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) in Telangana.
The list was released late at night by CEC General Secretary Mukul Wasnik.
The Congress, which is leading the four-party ‘Mahakutami’, plans to contest 95 seats, leaving the remaining for TDP, Telangana Jana Samithi (TJS) and Communist Party of India (CPI).
However, a formal agreement over seat sharing was yet to be reached.
Former union ministers, former state ministers, former MPs, sitting legislators and those who crossed over to the Congress from other parties have been included in the list of 65 candidates.
Among former union ministers Sarve Satyanarayana (Secunderabad Cantonment), while P. Balram Naik (Mahabubabad). Leader of Opposition in Telangana Legislative Council, Mohammed Ali Shabbir is Congress candidate from Kamareddy.
Former Deputy Chief Minister and chairman of manifesto committee C. Damodar Rajanarasimha has been fielded from Andole.
Congress has named V. Pratap Reddy as its candidate against Chief Minister and Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) president K. Chandrashekhar Rao in Gajwel.
(With agency inputs)