NEW DELHI: The Congress on Sunday unveiled its first list of 284 candidates for the upcoming West Bengal Assembly elections, signalling its decision to go solo in the state. The party said it will contest all 294 seats, leaving none vacant.Among the prominent candidates, former state unit chief Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury has been fielded from Baharampur, while former TMC MP Mausam Noor, who recently joined the Congress, will contest from Malatipur. Other names in the list include Madhap Rai (Darjeeling), Abdul Hannan (Sujapur), Susmita Biswas (Dum Dum), Gautam Bhattacharya (Diamond Harbour), Souvik Mukherjee (Asansol Dakshin) and Prasenjit Puitandi (Asansol Uttar).
The announcement came a day after the party’s Central Election Committee (CEC) held detailed deliberations on candidate selection. The meeting was attended by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, former party chief Rahul Gandhi, AICC general secretary (organisation) KC Venugopal, and senior leaders from West Bengal.Also present were CEC members Ambika Soni, Madhusudan Mistry, Salman Khurshid, T S Singhdeo, K J George, P L Punia and Amee Yajnik, along with AICC in-charge for West Bengal, Ghulam Ahmed Mir.Mir said the Congress had received a large number of applications for the polls. “We will contest all 294 assembly seats in West Bengal, leaving none vacant. This was the wish of our workers and rank and file in the state since the beginning. We have received 2,500 applications for these 294 seats,” he said.The West Bengal Assembly elections will be held in two phases on April 23 and 29, with counting of votes scheduled for May 4.