Seat-sharing for LS polls will be finalized in January: Ajoy Kumar

JAMSHEDPUR: State Congress president Ajoy Kumar on Thursday said a seat-sharing formula in Jharkhand for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections will be finalised in January next year. He said all constituents of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) in Jharkhand will be consulted in the run up to the January meeting before a formal announcement on the number of seats for each ally.

“The present day allies of UPA (namely) Congress, JMM, RJD, JVM and CPI are on board and the top leadership of respective parties will sit together to decide on a seat-sharing formula in Delhi in January 2019,” Kumar said at a press conference here.

The Congress leader iterated that as of now nothing is final on who will be the face of UPA in the 2019 assembly polls. “This is not the right time to ask this question,” Kumar replied when informed by the reporters that JMM working president and Leader of Opposition in the assembly, Hemant Soren, has projected himself as the apparent CM face of UPA in an interview to a few media houses.

Meanwhile, the Congress party has announced to stage a dharna at the headquarters in all 24 districts on Friday in support of the demands of para teachers who are on an agitation for weeks.

“We demand from the state government to accept all demands of the 67,000 para teachers who are on a prolonged agitation,” Kumar said, promising that the jobs of the para teachers will be regularized if the Congress-led UPA comes to the power in the state next year.

The former MP also demanded that chief minister Raghubar Das’s government announce a monetary compensation of Rs 25 lakh each of the kin of the para teachers who have lost their lives during the agitation.

“Along with the monetary compensation, one member from the family of the deceased para teacher should be given a government job,” he said.

Kumar also dared the CM to waive off loans of the farmers as done in the Congress-ruled states of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh.