Dissent in AAP over M'lore LS candidate

M’lore Airport former director M R Vasudeva’s name almost finalised

As political parties are busy finalising their candidates for the Lok Sabha elections, dissention appears to be brewing in new political party AAP over the candidate for Mangalore constituency. 

According to sources, the state level election committee has almost finalised the name of Mangalore Airport former director M R Vasudeva, considering him as a special case.

However, this has not gone well with a large number of party workers and volunteers as they were neither consulted nor their opinions elicited before finalising the name. 

Sources said that two district unit leaders referred the name of Vasudeva, a non-AAP member, to the state committee. Thereafter, the state committee finalised his name after the interview. The candidate for the Mangalore constituency is likely to be declared this week. 

Procedure questioned 

However, the district unit members and volunteers are questioning the procedure followed for selection of the candidate. The AAP, on its website, had invited applications from interested people to contest the parliamentary election.

Those interested had to file the application online, along with minimum 100 signatures of voters from each of the Assembly segments within the Lok Sabha constituency. As per the procedure, the national selection committee was finalise a few names and send them to state committee to call the candidates for an interview.

Then, the further pruned list was to be sent to the district committee for deciding on the candidate. 

It is alleged that Vasudeva was directly selected by the state committee, considering him as a man with good stature.The state committee had also called social activist Vidya Dinker for the interview but she did not attend.

The names of former economic advisor to prime minister Jagadish Shettigar and former bureaucrat Harish Gowda had also made rounds. The committee settled for Vasudeva, who is said to have shown enthusiasm to fight the elections.

When Deccan Herald contacted Vasudeva, he said that his name was in the list and was not aware of the final decision of the State committee. “I will contest the election, if I get support from  party workers,” he said.  

“The AAP, which touts of following transparency in the selection of candidates, has not stuck to its words. Though, Vasudeva is a non-controversial person and an eligible candidate, the decision  was arbitrary as the old party workers and members had no say in it,” said a source. 

However, another source ruled out workers protesting against the decision. “We will support the candidate, whoever it is,” the source said.