Guwahati: In an unusual move aimed at taking on the saffron alliance, Congress ally Raijor Dal withdrew three candidates from the election fray, a step party chief Akhil Gogoi described as a sacrifice for the sake of better opposition unity.On Sunday, Akhil unveiled a revised list of 12 candidates, removing Harikanta Das from Nowboicha, Babul Sonowal from Dhemaji, and Romen Chandra Borthakur from Jalukbari. All these three seats have been relinquished to Congress candidates.Akhil apologised to the three leaders, saying their tickets had to be given up to help finalise the opposition alliance.Raijor Dal will announce one more nominee, who will contest from Bokakhat against Asom Gana Parishad president Atul Bora.Apart from Akhil, who has been renominated from Sibsagar, the final list features former Congress leader and sitting MLA Abdur Rashid Mandal from Goalpara East, student and youth leader Rahul Cherty from Margherita, Abul Mian from Gauripur, Azizur Rahman from Dalgaon, Anjan Talukdar from Manas, Mehboob Muktar from Dhing, Pradip Kumar Baruah from Kaliabor, Alok Nath from Tezpur, Dulal Chandra Baruah from Sissiborgaon, and Gyanashree Bora from Mariani.Dulal Moran has been named in place of Lakhyajyoti Gogoi, who was earlier announced as the party’s candidate from Digboi.While releasing the revised list on Sunday morning, Akhil said those whose names appeared earlier but were missing from the new list would no longer remain candidates. He added that withdrawing candidates was a tough call, but it was necessary in the interest of opposition unity and to resist the “communal BJP-RSS”.“The candidate list we announced today is the final list. Only due to some technical difficulties we are unable to name the Bokakhat candidate. Once the name of the Bokakhat candidate is announced, we will have 13 candidates,” Akhil added.“We were ready to contest polls in 64 assembly constituencies but had to reduce the number of seats to only 13 for the sake of defeating BJP. We were helpless and that’s why we had to leave out an MLA like Sherman Ali Ahmed, and party’s working president Romen Chandra Borthakur and senior leaders like Dhaijjya Konwar,” Akhil told the media.He said Babul Sonowal had strong winning prospects and that Harikanta was as capable a leader as Moslemuddin Ahmed, Raijor Dal’s candidate from Birsing Jaruwa. “Since our main target is to defeat BJP and save the country and community, we are unable to give tickets to many competent candidates. I apologise to all with folded hands,” Akhil added.Akhil, who contested from jail and won the 2021 assembly election, said he was confident of victory again because of his efforts to bring the maximum number of schemes to Sivasagar, despite spending the last five years on the opposition bench.
