Madhya Pradesh elections: Talks over Congress's ticket allotment inconclusive

Senior Congress leaders have been entrusted with the task of sorting out differences between party leaders from Madhya Pradesh over allotment of tickets for the November 28 assembly elections as talks at the central election committee meeting remained inconclusive, sources said on Thursday.

According to sources, during the meeting of the central election committee on late on Wednesday, Congress leaders Digvijaya Singh and Jyotiraditya Scindia exchanged heated notes in the presence of party chief Rahul Gandhi.

The CEC meeting for Madhya Pradesh remained inconclusive after it continued till hours beyond midnight.

This was followed by a meeting of the leaders from Madhya Pradesh and the central screening committee of the state chaired by Madhusudan Mistry with Ahmed Patel, Ashok Gehlot and M Veerappa Moily.

While batting for their respective candidates, Scindia and Singh exchanged heated notes, the sources said.

This forced Gandhi to ask Patel, Gehlot and Moily to sit with the "warring" leaders and resolve the differences, they said.

"The senior leaders have also been asked to first evolve a consensus among the various factions of Madhya Pradesh Congress and hold the next meeting," a senior leaders told PTI.

Insiders say a third meeting of the CEC, the party's body for selecting candidates, for Madhya Pradesh to be held on Thursday evening was cancelled as no consensus could be brought about between the various state leaders over party tickets.

The meeting is now likely to be held on Friday.

No candidate has been announced for the state polls.

The process of nominations for Madhya Pradesh starts Friday with the issue of gazette notification.

Asked about the issue, AICC general secretary Gehlot denied reports of any differences between the leaders and claimed that the party leadership in Madhya Pradesh was united.

"There was no such fight between the leaders as reported in a section of the media. All the leaders in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan are united," he said.

Gehlot said lengthy meetings of the CEC have taken place to ensure that the candidate selection process ends soon.

"Long meetings are taking place to speed up the selection process for candidates," he said.

Singh also rejected reports about any differences with Scindia or any argument with him in Gandhi's presence.

"It is being wrongly reported in press that I and Jyotiraditya Scindia ji had any argument and Rahul ji had to intervene. All of us in MP Congress are one and determined to defeat the corrupt BJP Government in MP," he said.