After being vetted by the Election Committee and Screening Committee, a shortlist of three candidates per seat will be sent to the CWC.
Published Aug 17, 2023 | 8:43 PM ⚊ Updated Aug 18, 2023 | 1:37 AM
Congress party headquarters Gandhi Bhavan in Hyderabad. (Supplied)
Taking a leaf out of the playbook of the party’s state unit in Karnataka, the Telangana Congress has fixed a fee for those applying for tickets to contest in the Assembly elections slated for November-December this year.
The process of the sale of the application forms will begin at Gandhi Bhavan, the headquarters of the party in Hyderabad, on Friday, 18 August. Those interested should submit their applications by 25 August.
In Karnataka, the cost of the application form to apply for a Congress ticket for Assembly elections was ₹5,000. While submitting forms, those in the general category were required to enclose a demand draft for ₹2 lakh, while the fee for Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (SC/ST) applicants was fixed at ₹1 lakh.
The idea, the brainchild of state Congress president and now Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar, helped the cash strapped party with election expenses.
In Telangana, however, the rates have been fixed at much lower levels, with party leaders telling South First that the idea was to discourage all and sundry from applying for tickets. The funds collected through the exercise would be utilised to build a new party building, and for expenses in the elections.
The party has fixed ₹50,000 for those in the general category and ₹25,000 for the SC, ST, and Backward Classes (BC) candidates.
The aspirants would have to fill the relevant columns in the four-page application form, which seeks details of their present status in the Congress, the service rendered to the party, the positions held, experience in contesting elections in the past, if they have worked in other parties in the past, how active they are on social media, and criminal cases and convictions, if any.
The party will also take an undertaking that regardless of whether they win the election or lose, they would stay with the party.
Special counters have been set up at Gandhi Bhavan for receiving applications. After the receipt of applications, the Election Committee, headed by state Congress president A Revanth Reddy will go through the applications.
After shortlisting the names, the list would be sent to Screening Committee chairman K Muralidharan, who, too, would go through the details furnished by the candidates.
The committee will further shortlist the number to three for each Assembly segment and will send them to the Central Election Committee which would announce the list after approval by the Congress Working Committee (CWC), the party’s highest decision-making body.
