Union minister Manish Tewari to contest from Ludhiana

Congress has decided to re-nominate Union minister Manish Tewari from Ludhiana seat and his candidature will be announced soon.

Party sources said that the final call to field Tewari was taken today in a meeting chaired by party president Sonia Gandhi.

Tewari, the Union Information and Broadcasting Minister, was admitted to a private hospital's cardiology department on March 15 after he complained of uneasiness.

He was discharged after two days on March 17.

There was report that Tewari was interested in contesting from Chandigarh, from where former Railway Minister Pawan Kumar Bansal has been nominated by the party.

There was speculation that Tewari was not keen to contest from the seat and the party may not field him citing health reasons.

However, AICC general secretary in-charge for Chandigarh Shakeel Ahmed scotched the speculation asking when did Tewari say he did not want to contest.

Senior Congress leader O P Soni could be fielded from Amritsar Lok Sabha seat to take on senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley as former Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh made it clear that he was not interested in fighting from Amritsar.

Soni was defeated by BJP's Navjot Singh Sidhu in 2009 Lok Sabha polls by a narrow margin.

Punjab Congress chief Partap Singh Bajwa, who is considered not to be on best of terms with Amarinder Singh, is learnt to have recommended to the party leadership that the former Punjab CM could be a formidable candidate to take on Jaitley.

In a statement, Amarinder, however, maintained that Congress has strong local leaders in Amritsar who can take on Jaitley.

Amarinder said besides being an outsider he does not know Amritsar as much as someone from that area. "I will also not be able to spend required period of time there."

Image: Union minister Manish Tewari