Thiruvananthapuram: The Communist Party of India (Marxist) has decided to field A A Rahim as its candidate for the Rajya Sabha elections. The decision was taken by the party's state committee on Wednesday.
Rahim is a member of the CPM's state committee and also the national president of the Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI), the party's youth wing.
A youngster familiar with Delhi politics
Earlier, Rahim was the state secretary of the DYFI and the vice-president of the Students' Federation of India (SFI).
Rahim succeeded P A Mohammed Riyas as the DYFI national president after the latter was appointed minister last year.
Rahim unsuccessfully contested the 2011 Assembly polls from Varkala. Ever since, he has been an active face in the organisational affairs of the left party and its youth wing. The CPM's desire to nominate a young person familiar with the political processes in Delhi played to Rahim's advantage.
The elections to the three Upper House seats in the Parliament will be held on March 31 in the State.
As reported earlier, the CPM and the Communist Party of India (CPI) would contest two of the three seats. The candidates of both the parties are certain to win the seats, considering the strength of their political alliance, the Left Democratic Front (LDF), in the Assembly. CPI's candidate is P Santosh Kumar.
Meanwhile, the United Democratic Front (UDF) is set to retain its lone seat, which will be vacated by Congress leader A K Antony. However, the party is yet to announce a candidate.
