Kochi: The Election Commission is yet to fix the dates for the six assembly bypolls in Kerala, but the Congress party in Ernakulam constituency has already switched itself into the election mode.
Ernakulam, known as a bastion of the Congress-led UDF, is one seat where the front has high hopes and it does not want to lose it at any cost.
The constituency has fallen vacant after former MLA Hibi Eden won the Lok Sabha polls from Ernakulam constituency.
Sources in the Congress said the party has already started preparations for the bypoll even though the talks on candidate are yet to start.
However, a top Congress leader told Onmanorama that the party is most likely to pick a youngster as its candidate.
The statement implicates that veteran leader K V Thomas, the lone sitting Congress MP in the state who was denied the ticket to contest the recently-held Lok Sabha polls, is unlikely to be the UDF candidate in Ernakulam. When Hibi was chosen to contest the Parliament seat represented by Thomas there were speculations that the latter could be compensated with the assembly seat.
The leader who spoke to Onmanorama also ruled out the possibility of a woman being fielded in the segment. This closes speculations over Kochi Corporation Mayor Soumini Jain getting a chance.
As of now, Ernakulam DCC president T J Vinod and former mayor Tony Chammany are the top contenders for the candidature. Vinod, who is also the deputy mayor of the corporation, is a prominent face of ‘I’ faction in the district. His Latin Catholic background could also come handy for him. The ‘A’ group is favouring Chammany.
Vinod, however, told Onmanorama that no such discussions over candidate selection have taken place in the party yet.
V D Satheesan, MLA, who is in charge of the Congress's election affairs in the constituency, rejected all speculations and said the party forums are yet to start talks on candidates.
He said the party is ready to face the polls anytime now.
Satheesan said the party would not be complacent after the stunning victory it had in the Lok Sabha polls. “We will face the bypolls as a fresh machinery,” he said, adding that the party workers were engaged in adding the names that were omitted from the voters' list during the Lok Sabha polls.
“We will also identify the booths where our work was weak during the LS polls and the errors we committed last time would be rectified,” he said.
Exuding confidence about the party's vote base in Ernakulam, Satheesan said the Congress would lose the seat only if the party give up the fight.
In the recent LS polls, Hibi Eden got 61,920 votes from the Ernakulam assembly segment, while his nearest rival CPM's P Rajeev got only 30,742. NDA candidate Alphons Kannanthanam had to settle for 17,769 votes. In the 2016 assembly poll's Hibi had polled 57,819 votes from the seat.
