Congress prez poll: It's Kharge vs Tharoor as K N Tripathi's nomination rejected

Former Jharkhand minister K N Tripathis nomination for the Congress presidential election was rejected on Saturday leaving party leaders Mallikarjun Kharge and Shashi Tharoor in the frayThe three had filed nominations on Friday the last day of the processThe last date for withdrawal of nominations is October 8 and the final list of candidates will be out at 5 pm on the same dayAddressing a press conference at the Congress headquarters here the partys central election authority chairman Madhusudan Mistry said the panel met for scrutiny of forms on SaturdayAlso Read Union Minister Kapil Patil mocks Congress prez polls for twists and turnsA total of 20 forms were received during the nomination process Four of them were rejected as signatures were repeated or did not match he saidWhile Kharge submitted 14 forms Tharoor submitted five and Tripathi oneTwo candidates Kharge and Tharoor are in a direct contest now One form of another candidate from Jharkhand has been rejected Mistry saidThere is a sevenday window for withdrawal of forms till October 8 when the picture will be clearer he saidIf no one withdraws the polling will be held he addedMistry said Tripathis form was rejected as the signature of one of his proposers did not match and another proposers signature was repeatedWhile one rejected form was of Tripathi Mistry refused to divulge who had filed the other three forms that were rejectedReacting to the development and sharing the list of valid nominations issued by the chief election authority Tharoor tweeted Delighted to learn that following scrutiny Shri Kharge and I will be squaring off in the friendly contest for President of Congress May the Party and all our colleagues benefit from this democratic processAccording to a notification issued by the party on Thursday the process for filing nominations for the election was from September 24 to 30The polling if needed will be held on October 17 The counting of votes will be taken up on October 19 and the results will be declared the same dayMore than 9000 Pradesh Congress Committee PCC delegates will vote in the pollThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever