Kamal Nath appoints 70 constituency campaign chiefs to pacify rebels

BHOPAL: Ahead of assembly elections, state Congress president Kamal Nath has appointed 70 campaign in-charge in assembly constituencies in the past four days to pacify rebels and disappointed tickets aspirants. Thirty more such dissenters will be given charge of campaigning in constituencies, though not necessarily in the seats they aspired for party candidature. “All rebels have been placated,” said state Congress organisational vice-president Chandraprabhash Sekhar. “There are only five to six rebels who remain adamant and the party might have to expel them,” he said.

The list of rebels in the Congress office on Thursday morning counted to eight such names – Anurag Hazare who is contesting as Samajwadi Party (SP) candidate from Pathariya seat, Aditya Solomon contesting as independent from Jabera, Pradeep Khateek filed nomination as independent from Hata, Bhuvan Vikram Singh who resigned from Congress party and fighting as independent from Pawai constituency, Mahesh Patel as Gondwana Gantantra Party candidate from Maihar, BL Sarkhare fielded as AAP candidate from Mandla, Rajesh Mahto who is now BSP candidate from Maharajpur and Akhilesh Dubey contesting as SP candidate from Sagar.

“Congress party is much more unified than the BJP. Look at them, the BJP had to expel 52 rebels from primary membership. We have so far expelled only one Xavier Meda,” Chandraprabhash Sekhar explained. On Wednesday, the party expelled former MLA Meda from the primary membership after he refused to withdraw his candidature against party candidate Dr Vikrant Bhuria from Jhabua. Meda won the 2008 elections by a margin of over 19,000 votes against BJP’s Pavesingh Pargi but lost 2013 against Shantilal Bilwal by more than 15,800 votes.

The party, however, is silent on Nitin Chaturvedi who is the son of senior party leader and former Rajya Sabha MP Satyavrat Chaturvedi. Nitin is contesting as SP candidate from Rajnagar assembly seat in Chhattarpur district. His father wanted party ticket for Nitin from the seat but senior leaders could not deny candidature to three times MLA Vikram Singh Natiraja. “Nitin Chaturvedi is already contesting as SP candidate. How can the party expel him when he is no longer with us,” Chandraprabhash Sekhar argued. Satyavrat Chaturvedi has openly announced he will campaign for his son but Congress still maintains he is party’s star campaigner.

On Thursday, state PCC sent a letter of appointment to Mona Gaurav who has been made campaign chief for the vital Hoshangabad seat where the contest is between Speaker Sitasharan Sharma for BJP and former Shivraj Singh Chouhan cabinet minister Sartaj Singh for Congress. Similarly, Sehore district Congress general secretary Mohammad Rashid has been appointed campaign chief for Sonkatch, Hitesh Thakur working president of Dhar district Congress for Dhar assembly seat and Mann Singh Choudhary for Mandsaur.

“PCC chief Kamal Nath has accommodated those disappointed with not getting tickets into the organisation. They have been given specific duty of campaigning for the party and when the candidate wins, credit for the victory can be shared between candidate and campaign chief,” a senior PCC office-bearer said. “Till Thursday morning 70 letters have been sent out and 30 are still to go,” he added.