A screening committee of the Congress on Wednesday vetted the names of former chief minister Mukul Sangma and union minister Vincent H Pala as the party candidates from two Lok Sabha seats in Meghalaya.
Meghalaya has two parliamentary constituencies — Shillong and Tura — that will go to polls on April 11.
Sangma, who is currently the Leader of Opposition in the Meghalaya Assembly, will be contesting from the Tura Lok Sabha seat.
Pala, the incumbent Congress Lok Sabha member was nominated from Shillong parliamentary seat. Pala had won the last parliamentary elections by a margin of 40,379 votes against Independent candidate PBM Basaiawmoit.
“The screening committee has cleared the names of Mukul Sangma and Vincent Pala as the party nominees to contest the Lok Sabha elections. The party will officially declare their names in a day or two,” a Congress leader said.
Sangma, who is also the chairman of the North East Congress Coordination Committee (NECCC), is contesting the upcoming elections at party’s request.
“Although I had not applied for a party ticket, the party has requested me to contest elections from Tura parliamentary constituency in the interest of the people and the nation at large,” Sangma said.
On Monday, the ruling National People’s Party (NPP)-led Meghalaya Democratic Alliance (MDA) government announced it would jointly field former Union Minister Agatha K. Sangma from the Tura Lok Sabha seat and United Democratic Party (UDP)’s Jemino Mawthoh from Shillong.
Both Mawthoh and Agatha Sangma, the sister of the chief minister sangma, will contest on symbols of their own party’s — the UDP and the NPP, respectively.
The BJP, which is also part of the NPP-led six-party MDA, decided to field its own candidates from the state’s two parliamentary constituencies.
