Thiruvananthapuram | AICC President Mallikarjun Kharge on Wednesday appointed senior Congress leader Ramesh Chennithala as the chairman of the Congress's Lok Sabha election campaign committee in Kerala.

In a statement, the AICC said that the Congress president has approved the proposal for the appointment of Chennithala as the chairman of the campaign committee of the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee for the upcoming general elections, with immediate effect.

Chennithala's appointment coincides with the Congress's decision to once again nominate Rahul Gandhi for the Wayanad Lok Sabha seat.

The party has fielded 16 candidates from Kerala, prominent among them being AICC General Secretary (Organisation) K C Venugopal and CWC member Shashi Tharoor.

The Congress has fielded all the sitting MPs except T N Prathapan in Thrissur, with the hope of replicating its 2019 victory in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.

The constituents of the Congress-led UDF will contest the four other seats, with the Indian Union Muslim League fielding candidates in two segments and Kerala Congress (Joseph) and the Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) each fielding one.

The party-led UDF had won 19 out of 20 seats in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. The number decreased to 18 after the Kerala Congress (M), which won the Kottayam seat, switched over to the CPI(M)-led LDF before the 2021 assembly polls.