Congress has released its first list of candidates for the April 6 Kerala Assembly polls with former Chief Minister Oomen Chandy fielded from his traditional Puthupally seat and Leader of Opposition Ramesh Chennithala from Haripad. Kerala PCC Chief Mullappally Ramachandran, who met the media at Delhi after deliberations with the screening committee and the Congress high command, announced the list of 86 candidates out of the 92 seats which the party would be contesting.
The Congress, which heads the United Democratic Front, is contesting in 91 out of the state's 140 constituencies. Former Chief Minister K. Karunakaran's daughter Padmaja Venugopal has been given ticket from Thrissur, V.S. Sivakumar has been fielded from Thiruvanthapuram and K. Muraleedharan from Nemom, the lone seat won by the BJP in the 2016 Assembly polls.
The Indian Union Muslim League will be contesting on 27 seats, the Kerala Congress-Joseph has been allotted 10 seats, the RSP will field candidates in five seats, and the Nationalist Congress Party Kerala, led by Mani C. Kappen, which had recently severed ties with the NCP -- a part of the CPI-M-led Left Democratic Front, and joined the UDF, will be given two seats, including Pala. One seat each has been allocated to the Kerala Congress-Jacob, the Bharatiya National Janata Dal and Communist Marxist Party, led by C.P. John.
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