Headlines
Congress to field Karthikeyan's son in Kerala bypoll
Thiruvananthapuram, May 30
After hectic
parleys at all levels in the Congress in Kerala, the party has decided
to field K.S. Sabarinathan for the June 27th by-election for Aruvikara
assembly constituency in the capital district. He is the younger son of
late assembly speaker G. Karthikeyan, whose death in March this year
necessitated the bypoll.
An engineer by profession and holding an
MBA degree, Sabarinathan, 31, is presently working as manager, Human
Resource, Tata Trust, Mumbai.
The first priority among party
leaders though was M.T. Sulekha, the widow of Karthikeyan, state party
chief V.M. Sudheeran told reporters at Congress headquarters here on
Saturday.
"But she expressed her inability to contest.
Incidentally, Rahul Gandhi (when he came to see Karthikeyan when he was
unwell) was also sounded by Karthikeyan about Sabarinathan's interest in
politics. In fact, while doing his engineering course, Sabarinathan had
contested college union elections as Congress student wing candidate
and hence he is not new to politics," said Sudheeran.
"I know the
constituency very well and what happens is that at times, things which
one never even dreams of become a reality. My father has been nurturing
this constituency for the past 24 years and has done numerous
development works.
"Today, the victory of Congress-led UDF
candidate is a necessity and it will enable me to complete projects that
my father started," Sabarinathan told reporters soon after his name was
announced.
CPI-M candidate and former speaker and minister M. Vijayakumar has already started his campaign.