K.C. Venugopal surprise name in first Congress LS list, K. Muraleedharan moved to Thrissur

Thiruvananthapuram, March 8: Congress General Secretary, Organisation, K.C. Venugopal's name was a surprise among the Lok Sabha candidates from Kerala in the party's first list released in New Delhi on Friday.

Presently a member of the Rajya Sabha, Venugopal returns to his home turf at Alappuzha, which he won in the 2009 and 2014 Lok Sabha polls. In 2019, he had decided not to contest and that was just the only seat of the state's 20 that the ruling CPI-M-led Left won at the polls then.

Another big surprise was K. Muraleedharan, the sitting Lok Sabha member from Badagara in Kozhikode district, being moved to Thrissur - the home turf of his father and Congress veteran K. Karunakaran.

Incidentally, the move comes a day after his sister and Congress leader Padmaja Venugopal joined the BJP.

Sitting Thrissur MP T.N.Prathapan has moved out of the fray.

Another big surprise is the fielding of the three-time sitting legislator from Palakkad, Shafi Parambil, 41, from the Badagara seat.

In the 2019 polls, of the UDF constituents, the IUML won both the seats it contested, and so did the RSP in Kollam. Kottayam was won by the Kerala Congress-Mani, but now the party has shifted to the ruling CPI-M-led Left Front.

The others in the Congress list are all sitting members who will be defending their seats and include Rahul Gandhi (Wayanad), Shashi Tharoor (Thiruvananthapuram), Adoor Prakash (Attingal), Anto Antony (Pathanamthitta), state Congress President K. Sudhakaran (Kannur), Kodikunnil Suresh (Mavelikera), Hibi Eden (Ernakulam), Dean Kuriakose (Idukki), Benny Behanan (Chalakudy), Remya Haridas (Alathur), V.K. Sreekantan (Palakkad), M.K.Raghavan (Kozhikode) and Rajmohan Unnithan (Kasargod)