By IANS,
Chennai : Tamil Nadu Congress chief K.V. Thangkabalu will contest the April 13 elections from Mylapore here after the nomination of his wife, the party’s official candidate, was rejected Monday.
The Election Commission rejected the nomination of Jayanthi Thangkabalu, citing the lack of some documents. Mylapore is a dominantly middle class area in the heart of Chennai.
Thangkabalu had filed his nomination as the party’s alternate candidate as there was severe opposition to his wife’s candidature from party workers.
Thangkabalu told reporters that he would ask the Election Commission to find out how the documents went missing as the nomination was accepted by the returning officer after the documents had been verified.
The candidature of Jayanthi Thangkabalu sparked protests, with furious party activists demonstrating outside the party leader’s residence in this city and burning his effigy.
The Congress rebel candidate in Mylapore, Sivagami, complained to the poll panel that Jayanthi concealed that she was the managing director of Mega TV, a Tamil channel owned by Thangkabalu.
Former city mayor R. Thiagarajan, a loyalist of Home Minister P. Chidambaram, had sought the party’s mandate to contest from Mylapore.
Outgoing legislator S.Ve. Shekhar too had sought renomination. He won the seat in 2006 as the AIADMK’s candidate and later joined the Congress.
The Congress, a part of the DMK-led alliance, is contesting 63 seats in Tamil Nadu.