Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Jan 29: All India Congress Screening Committee, headed by Bhakta Charan Dass (Ex-MP) is arriving Jammu on February 2 to shortlist party candidates ahead of Lok Sabha elections in the Jammu and Kashmir.
Party sources said that besides Dass, the Screening Committee members including Neeraj Dangi and Bharat Singh Solanki, Incharge J&K affairs of the party, will hold detailed discussions with the J&K Congress Screening Committee members with regard to selection of potential candidates for all the five Lok Sabha seats in the J&K.
Sources further said that the state level committee has prepared lists of the candidates for all the five Lok Sabha seats. The AICC Screening Committee will shortlist the candidates out of these lists.
The lists will be forwarded to the All India Congress Alliance Committee headed by Mukul Vasnik. The other members of the panel are- Ashok Gehlot, Bhupesh Bagel and Mohan Prakash.This committee later shall hold discussions with the INDIA bloc partners in J&K- National Conference and People’s Democratic Party leaders- Dr Farooq Abdullah, Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti, for seat sharing arrangement. It is expected that Congress may stake its claim for Jammu-Reasi, Udhampur-Doda and Rajouri- Anantnag seats.
The Congress hopes that after alliance with regional parties- PDP and NC, it will be able to defeat the BJP in the coming Lok Sabha elections in J&K.
It is pertinent to mention here that Congress and the NC alliance won 22 out of the total 26 seats in the Ladakh Autonomous Hill Development Council (Kargil) polls in October 2023. The Council has a total of 30 members out of which four are nominated. The NC had won 12 while the Congress won 10 seats in the crucial polls which were the first ever elections held in the area after the abrogation of Article 370.
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