Ahead of the high-octane Karnataka State Assembly elections the ruling party in the state Congress has found itself in panic mode as a ‘fake‘ list of candidates started making rounds on social media. Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah accused that the fake list has been circulated to create confusion among the masses.
I am told a list of Congress candidates for Karnataka Election is under circulation.
The AICC has not approved the list of candidates yet. The “list” under circulation is fake. It has been done to create confusion.
Please don’t patronize products of the #FakeNews factory.
— Siddaramaiah (@siddaramaiah) April 10, 2018
As per reports, even though the screening committee meeting took place yesterday and the party leaders met Congress President Rahul Gandhi with their feedback on some of the candidates, the central election committee is yet to meet and decide on the candidates. However, the candidate selection process is already created a lot of controversy as a large number of sitting MLAs from Karnataka have reportedly sought tickets for their own family members.
Meanwhile, a group of Muslim leaders from Karnataka have demanded that the Congress party reserves at least one constituency in each district of the state for Muslim candidates. With a population size of about 12 percent, the group held a meeting with leaders in Delhi to convince senior leaders on why Muslims should get a better deal this time.
In 2013, about 19 Muslim aspirants were given party tickets in different constituencies and 10 had won.