Assam SEC joins Congress, seeks LS ticket

Samudra Gupta Kashyap


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Guwahati: Chandra Kanta Sharma, state election commissioner of Assam, has resigned from the post and joined the Congress party and sought nomination of the party for the Mangaldoi Lok Sabha constituency.

Sharma, who was appointed state election commissioner by the Congress-led Government after his retirement as commissioner and secretary in the general administration department in 2006, resigned on Saturday and joined the Congress party yesterday.

"I have a strong family background of freedom fighters. My father was a devout Congressman who took active part in the freedom movement. There is also tremendous pressure on me from people in the districts that come under Mangaldoi Lok Sabha constituency to contest the forthcoming elections," Sharma said.

Sharma's tenure as state election commissioner would have ended in 2011. "But, since I have already conducted the panchayat elections successfully, and since there is nothing much to do in the next two years, I decided to quit and join active politics. And, Congress is my obvious choice," he told 'The Indian Express'.