Five sitting MPs, four MLAs and two district secretaries figure in the Communist Party of India (Marxist) candidates’ list for the Lok Sabha elections released by State secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan here on Saturday.
P.K. Biju (Alathur), M.B. Rajesh (Palakkad), P.K. Sreemathy (Kannur), Innocent (Chalakudy) and A. Sampath (Attingal) have been give another chance to run from their sitting seats.
A. Pradeep Kumar, who represents Kozhikode North in the Assembly, has been fielded from Kozhikode, Aranmula MLA Veena George from Pathanamthitta, Nilambur MLA P.V. Anwar from Ponnani and Aroor MLA A.M. Ariff from Alappuzha.
Kottayam district secretary V.N. Vasavan will join the race in Kottayam and Kannur district secretary P. Jayarajan from Vadakara.
Candidates
The party has decided to field K.P. Satish Chandran from Kasaragod, SFI president V.P. Sanu from Malappuram, former Rajya Sabha members P. Rajeev from Ernakulam and K.N. Balagopal from Kollam, and support incumbent Left Democratic Front member Joyce George in Idukki. The CPI has announced its candidates for four seats earlier. The CPI(M) and the CPI had shared 16 and 4 seats among them. Releasing the list, Mr. Balakrishnan said the LDF State committee had formally approved the list and the candidates would no more be party nominees, but representatives of the front.
Asked about the decision to field sitting MLAs, Mr. Balakrishnan said such experiments were done earlier and it was proof of the LDF’s confidence in winning the Assembly byelection if the incumbents were elected to the Lok Sabha.
Regarding the Bharatiya Janata Party decision to field Mizoram Governor Kummanam Rajasekharan in Thiruvananthapuram, Mr. Balakrishnan said it would not make any impact in the election and the real fight was between the LDF and the United Democratic Front (UDF) led by the Congress.
The BJP would not open its account in the current election too. If the party was so confident, it could have fielded Prime Minister Narendra Modi or party president Amit Shah from Thiruvananthapuram, he said.
Two women have been fielded from two seats which have high winning chances, he said adding the candidature of Mr. Jayarajan was a message against political violence.
“Mr. Jayarajan is a living martyr of political violence and his candidature is against such instances,” he said.
