Senior Congress leaders to sort out differences over allotment of tickets in Madhya Pradesh

Senior Congress leaders are given the responsibility to sort out differences between party leaders from Madhya Pradesh over allotment of tickets for November 28 assembly elections as talks at the central election committee meeting remained inconclusive, sources said Thursday.

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The meeting of the central election committee on late Wednesday turned into a heated argument between Congress leaders Digvijaya Singh and Jyotiraditya Scindia. This happened in presence of party chief Rahul Gandhi, according to the sources.

The CEC meeting continued for many hours post-midnight but the resulting decision remained inconclusive.

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.

Scidia and Singh exchanged heated notes while fighting for their respective candidates, sources suggest. Rahul Gandhi was forced to ask Patel, Gehlot and Moily to conduct a meeting 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.

The meeting is likely to be held on Friday. So far no candidate has been announced for the state polls. The nominations process for Madhya Pradesh begins Friday with the issue of gazette notification.

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However, when the AICC general secretary Gehlot was probed about the issue, he denied reports of any differences between the leaders and asserted that the party stands united in Madhya Pradesh.

"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 claimed that the reason for lengthy meetings of the CEC was to ensure that the candidate selection process ends soon.

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

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"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.