Congress president Kharge drops old faces, adds fresh ones in Central Election Committee

Sep 04, 2023

New Delhi [India], September 4 : Ahead of key assembly elections slated this year, Congress national president Mallikarjun Kharge on Monday constituted a 16-member Central Election Committee. 
The development comes ahead of key Assembly elections in states like Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh.
"Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge has constituted the Central Election Committee," the All India Congress Committee (AICC) release read. 
The committee includes Mallikarjun Kharge, Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, Ambika Soni, Adhir Rajan Chowdhary, Salman Khurshid, Madhusudan Mistry, N Uttam Kumar Reddy, TS Singh Deo, KJ George, Pritam Singh, Mohammad Jawed, Amee Yajnik, PL Punia, Omkar Markam, KC Venugopal.

Among the new faces, new questions have been set up from each state, former Uttarakhand Congress chief Pritam Singh, from West Bengal Adhir Rajan Chowdhary, Bihar MP Mohammed Jawed and Rajya Sabha MP from Gujarat Amee Yajnik, besides former MP from Uttar Pradesh PL Punia and General Secretary of Madhya Pradesh Congress, Former Member of Rajya Sabha Madhusudan Mistry, and Lok Sabha MP from Telangana Uttam Kumar Reddy have also been included as members of the all-important panel.
Chhattisgarh Deputy Chief Minister T S Singh Deo, and former Union minister Salman Khurshid who has been given weightage, besides Karnataka minister KJ George, are also members of the key panel.
If few new faces have been included, then a few names have been dropped too including Mukul Wasnik, Girija Vyas, Mohsina Kidwai and Janardan Dwivedi who was kept in the Central Election Committee (CEC). 
The Assembly polls in five states-- Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Telangana and Mizoram are slated this year.