Cong's Rajya Sabha polls candidates list triggers protests

The announcement of ten Rajya Sabha candidates on Sunday night triggered some protests in the party with a prominent spokesperson Pawan Khera appearing disappointed over his exclusion and said that it appeared that there were some shortcomings in his party work.

While he received support from some of the known but junior party faces, actress-turned politician Nagma also expressed her disappointment, saying her 18 years of work paled before Imran Pratapgarhi, who was chosen as a candidate from Maharashtra.

Khera said in a cryptic tweet, "it seems there were some shortcomings in my work." He received support from leaders like Sadaf Jafar and Pankuri Pathak, who contested the Uttar Pradesh elections.

Nagma, a Mahila Congress General Secretary, minced no words when she mentioned the candidature of Pratapgarhi from Maharashtra. Quoting Khera's tweet, she said, "my work for 18 years also appeared pale before Imran bhai's."

There has been criticism of the Congress list as eight of the ten leaders chosen as candidates for seven states were not natives. In poll-bound Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh, from where Congress expects to win five, none of the candidates are from the state.

The party chose Gandhi loyalists like Randeep Surjewala, Ajay Maken, Rajeev Shukla and Ranjeet Ranjan among others. While P Chidambaram, Jairam Ramesh and Vivek Tankha who were sitting MPs, Chhaya Verma from Chhattisgarh failed to get renomination.