PC frontrunner for the lone RS nomination for Cong from TN

CHENNAI: The state Congress should experience little trouble in finalising its candidate for the lone Rajya Sabha nomination this time. If sources in the state party unit are to be believed, consensus might not be hard to achieve in Tamil Nadu Congress in fielding a candidate for the June 10 biennial election to nominate a member to the Upper House of the Parliament. Alliance leader DMK, which announced candidates for three seats a week ago, has allocated one seat to the Congress party.

Grapevine has it that former union finance minister P Chidambaram could likely be the Congress candidate for the lone seat.

A party source who admitted to the former union finance minister being the consensus candidate so far, said the previous meeting between Chidambaram and chief minister M K Stalin a few months ago was also related to the RS nomination.

Strangely, the presence of PC in the RS race did not discourage incumbent TNCC president K S Alagiri from throwing his hat in the ring.

A Congress senior who did not wish to be named revealed that the incumbent TNCC chief was trying his luck and he had left the city for the national capital Sunday evening to lobby with the party’s national leadership for another term as MP.

“PC is the frontrunner for the nomination. Sending Chidambaram to the Rajya Sabha might not help the party much in Tamil Nadu, but his expertise, knowledge and stature will be essential to countering the ruling BJP in the Parliament. Alagiri cannot match that aspect of PC, ” said the TNCC senior on condition of anonymity.

Going by information trickling out of Sathyamurthy Bhavan, the RS candidate of TNCC might not be released for a little less than a week.

“Rahul is back in Delhi only on Monday. Leaders of Karnataka have already camped in Delhi for RS and MLC nomination in their state. AICC will decide everything together. Candidate list will not be released at least till the later half of the week, ” a TNCC source told DT Next.

“Unless some miracle happens, like it did in Kerala where Jebi Mather was chosen instead of seniors, the RS candidate of TNCC should not surprise many, ” the source added.