The Congress on Tuesday nominated former Maharashtra chief minister Ashok Chavan – whose name figured in the Adarsh housing society scam – from Nanded, ignoring opposition from within the party on fielding tainted leaders.
But, following Rahul Gandhi’s intervention, the party abandoned plans to field former Punjab chief minister Rajinder Kaur Bhattal in place of sitting MP Vijay Inder Singla from Sangrur. Bhattal, sources said, was reluctant to fight the polls since she had done no ground work in the constituency for a long time.
Party general secretary Madhusudan Mistry, a confidant of Rahul, was named to take on BJP’s prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi from Vadodara.
The list of 12, however, kept up suspense on the candidate from Varanasi that is witnessing a high- voltage contest between Modi and Arvind Kejriwal. It is speculated that party general secretary Digvijaya Singh could be fielded from the temple town.