Shillong, Mar 13 (IANS): A screening committee of the Congress on Wednesday vetted the names of former Meghalaya Chief Minister Mukul Sangma and Union Minister Vincent H. Pala as the party candidates from two Lok Sabha seats in Meghalaya, a Congress official said.
Meghalaya has two parliamentary constituencies -- Shillong and Tura -- that will go to polls on April 11.
Sangma, who is currently the Leader of Opposition in the Meghalaya Assembly, will be contesting from the Tura Lok Sabha seat.
Pala, the incumbent Congress Lok Sabha member was nominated from Shillong parliamentary seat. Pala had won the last parliamentary elections by a margin of 40,379 votes against Independent candidate P.B.M. Basaiawmoit.
"The screening committee has cleared the names of Mukul Sangma and Vincent Pala as the party nominees to contest the Lok Sabha elections. The party will officially declare their names in a day or two," a Congress official told IANS.
Sangma, who is also the Chairman of the North East Congress Coordination Committee (NECCC), is contesting the upcoming elections at party's request.
"Although I had not applied for a party ticket, the party has requested me to contest elections from Tura parliamentary constituency in the interest of the people and the nation at large," Sangma said.
On Monday, the ruling National People's Party (NPP)-led Meghalaya Democratic Alliance (MDA) government announced it would jointly field former Union Minister Agatha K. Sangma from the Tura Lok Sabha seat and United Democratic Party (UDP)'s Jemino Mawthoh from Shillong.
Both Mawthoh and Agatha Sangma, the sister of the Chief Minister and the youngest daughter of former Lok Sabha Speaker Purno Agitok Sangma, will contest on symbols of their own party's -- the UDP and the NPP, respectively.
Agatha Sangma, who won from Tura parliamentary constituency in the 2009 elections and served as Minister in the UPA-II government, had won the Assembly elections from South Tura last year. She, however, resigned from the seat to pave the way for Conrad Sangma to enter the Assembly.
However, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which is also part of the NPP-led six-party MDA, decided to field its own candidates from the state's two parliamentary constituencies.