"It is not necessary that the party will renominate all sitting MPs from the state. I would prefer new faces," Gogoi said. There would definitely be a number of new faces in the final list of candidates, Gogoi said. The nine sitting Congress MPs in Assam include controversial lottery don Mani Kumar Subba, who has been representing Tezpur for the past two terms.
Interestingly, even as 126 aspirants have applied for party tickets to the Assam Pradesh Congress Committee, one of the nine sitting MPs has not sought one for himself. A F Golam Osmani, who had won the Barpeta Lok Sabha seat last time, has instead projected his son as the prospective party candidate for the seat.
Even more interesting is the race for a ticket for the prestigious Guwahati seat. While sitting MP Kirip Chaliha, who has been at loggerheads with Gogoi for long, has applied for Mangaldoi in addition to Guwahati. Several party leaders have opposed his renomination.
Particularly vocal against him is Malaya Barman, MLA and president of the Assam Pradesh Mahila Congress. "We do not want Chaliha again. And if the party by any chance renominates him, the women's wing will not campaign for him," Barman has said. Former Assam Pradesh Youth Congress president Rekibuddin Ahmed too has openly opposed Chaliha's renomination.
Others who have sought Congress tickets from Guwahati include former Tata Tea geneal manager and head of Assam operations Bolin Bordoloi, former state education minister Pankaj Bora and Haren Das, a former MLA from Hajo.
Gogoi, meanwhile, has poured cold water on the prospects of another aspirant Chandra Kanta Sharma, a retired IAS officer who had quit the state election commissioner's post on Saturday and applied for a Congress ticket from Mangaldoi. "There is very little chance of Sharma getting a Congress ticket. When I talked to him a couple of days ago when he was still the state election commissioner, Sharma had flatly denied having any such inclination," Gogoi said
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