Jamshedpur, Jan. 18: The ?sidelined? women leaders in the Congress are a discontented lot but they are not going to take this meekly.

The women Congress leaders are peeved by the denial of ticket to Rajni Singh, despite her name being announced initially for the Jamshedpur East Assembly seat.

The district leaders of the women?s cell organised an emergency meeting at the party office this morning to voice their protest.

The district Congress women leaders said they had sent a fax to party president Sonia Gandhi urging her to intervene so that the women workers of the party are not sidelined during ticket distribution.

Initially, Singh?s name was pitted against BJP state president Raghubar Das to contest from Jamshedpur East. But later, she was replaced by the TWU president and senior INTUC leader, R.B.B. Singh.

District general secretary of the women?s wing of the party Shahnaz Rafique said, ?We have information that some partymen are frantically lobbying which has led to the denial of ticket to at least two other women candidates.?

?These two are Eva Shamim, the party nominee from Jamshedpur West and Pratibha Pandey, the Congress candidate from Hatia in Ranchi. This is not only unjust xbut also an insult to the women Congress workers of the state,? she added.

Out of the 33 seats that the party is planning to contest, four women candidates were identified by the state leadership and the screening committee of the party for tickets, they said.

Apart from Singh, Shamim and Pandey, Kunti Soy, widow of the slain West Singhbhum district president Vijay Singh Soy, were sure of getting tickets.

?Singh lost her ticket because of hectic lobbying by partymen. But we will not tolerate it if the other three women leaders are denied tickets,? Rafique said.

Claiming that women leaders of the party are as capable as their male counterparts, she said, ?We can go to any extent, without breaking the party discipline, to see to it that vested elements do not deny these women a chance to contest the election.?

The women?s wing of the district unit has contacted the women leaders of other districts on this issue.

?Ours is a party that has women at the helm of affairs at AICC and at the state. And despite this, if the women candidates are sidelined and ignored, it is too much for us to digest. We will not allow the men to ignore the women in the party,? the women leaders said.

However, the leaders did not blame Sonia Gandhi for the partisan attitude of the party towards them. ?How can she be blamed for what is happening within the party. She is acting on the feedback that she gets from the state leadership and the screening committee. Our fax is to apprise her of our stand,? the general secretary of the district women?s Congress said.