- By Akansha Pandey
- Wed, 15 Oct 2025 12:41 PM (IST)
- Source:Jagran News Network
The Congress party is poised to release its first list of candidates for the 2025 Bihar Assembly elections today, Wednesday, October 15. Following extensive deliberations that continued late into the night, the party has finalised names for approximately 43 seats, and the selected candidates have already been informed by phone.
The list was greenlit after several rounds of meetings involving the Congress's Screening Committee and the Central Election Committee at 10 Janpath and the AICC headquarters in Delhi. Top leaders, including Rahul Gandhi, Mallikarjun Kharge, Ajay Maken and KC Venugopal, were instrumental in reaching a consensus. A formal announcement is still pending as a final meeting is currently underway in Delhi to resolve the selection for another 17-18 seats where a decision has not yet been reached, often due to multiple strong claimants for a single constituency.
According to party sources, the primary cause for the delay in the list's release was the finalisation of the seat-sharing agreement among the constituent parties of the Grand Alliance. With that process now largely complete, the party is moving forward with its candidate announcements.
This year, the Congress's strategy is to infuse new energy into the organisation by prioritising young and grassroots-level faces. While several former candidates have been given tickets again, the selection process has focused on a combination of organisational strength, local political equations, and caste balance. The party has also placed significant emphasis on recommendations from its lower organisational units.
The leadership anticipates that the ticket distribution may lead to some discontent among long-time aspirants who were not selected. A second list of candidates is expected to be released within the next two to three days.
The Congress is aiming for a major comeback after a disappointing performance in the 2020 elections, where it won only 19 of the 70 seats it contested. The party is optimistic that a united Grand Alliance and a refreshed slate of candidates will lead to a significantly better outcome this time.