Congress to release first list of candidates for Odisha Assembly polls soon
Feb 19, 2024
Bhubaneswar (Odisha) [India], February 20 : The Congress will soon release its first list of candidates for the upcoming assembly polls in Odisha.
The decision was taken during a meeting of the Pradesh Election Committee (PEC) held here on Monday.
"The procedure for distribution of tickets will begin with an elaborate discussion on the applications received for both Lok Sabha and Assembly seats. The list prepared will then be taken to the screening committee in Delhi," OPCC president Sarat Pattanayak told ANI ahead of the meeting.
"The final decision will be taken by the All India Congress Committee," he added.
It is learned that a total of 3,000 aspirants have applied online for the assembly tickets from Congress, while 700 have applied for Lok Sabha tickets on the 'Project Pragaman' portal.
Earlier, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Rajiv Kumar said that it is fully prepared to conduct the 2024 Parliamentary and state assembly elections, simultaneously in Odisha.
"We are fully prepared to conduct the 2024 Parliamentary elections and state assembly elections. Every preparation is almost complete. I request all voters to come and participate in the festival of democracy, whether youths, women, or those staying in inaccessible areas," Kumar said, addressing a press conference.
The CEC informed that the Vidhan Sabha elections in Odisha will end by June 24, 2024, and the parliamentary elections will end by June 16.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) got the maximum number of seats, followed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress. The BJD won 12 seats, the BJP bagged 8 seats, and the Congress won one seat.
The BJD swept the state in the 2019 Assembly elections, winning 113 seats in the 2019 elections held simultaneously with the general elections. The BJP came a distant second with 23 seats, followed by the Congress with 9, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) with 1 and an independent candidate bagging another seat.
