Mumbai, October 16: A total of 797 Congress delegates from Maharashtra will cast their votes here on Monday to elect the new president of the party with veteran leader Mallikarjun Kharge and Lok Sabha MP Shashi Tharoor in the fray for the top post.
Out of these 797 delegates, 561 are from the party’s Maharashtra Pradesh unit, while 236 belong to the Mumbai unit. While the Maharashtra delegates will cast their vote at Tilak Bhavan, the grand old party’s state unit headquarters here, the Mumbai representatives will vote at its city unit office in south Mumbai. The voting will be held between 10 am and 4 pm. Congress President Election 2022: Mallikarjun Kharge Vows 50 Percent of Party Posts for Youngsters As per Udaipur Declaration.
There will be three booths for the delegates to cast their votes, a statement from the state Congress said. Congress’s state election returning officers Pallam Raju, Narendra Rawat and Krishna Punia are already in Mumbai with the ballot boxes. Congress President Elections 2022: Delegate List To Be Available From September 20, Says Madhusudan Mistry.
The delegates have been given identity cards of the All India Congress Committee (AICC) bar codes. The bar-coded identity card and any other identity proof like voter card, Aadhaar card, Pan card, driving licence, bank passbook will be required to be displayed before voting, the statement said.
Raju urged all delegates to participate in the election process. The results of the election will be out on October 19. Country-wide, more than 9,000 Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) delegates form the electoral college to pick the party chief in a secret ballot at over 65 polling booths across the country in an electoral contest which is taking place for the sixth time in the party’s 137-year history.
Kharge is considered the firm favourite for his perceived proximity to the Gandhis and backing by senior leaders, even as Tharoor has pitched himself as the candidate of change.
During the campaign, even though Tharoor has raised issues of uneven playing field, both candidates and the party have maintained that the Gandhis are neutral and that there is no “official candidate”.
The last electoral contest for the top post of the party took place in 2000 when Jitendra Prasada had suffered a crushing defeat at the hands of Sonia Gandhi.
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