V Kishore Chandra Deo Congress MP from Andhra Pradesh is  tipped to head  JPC on 2G, according to highly placed Congress sources.

There are other contendors from Lok Sabha Congress MPs Francisco Sardinha or Vijay Bahuguna. But Sonia Gandhi is also  keen to have a woman MP  Girija Vyas.  But the key contendor is V Kishore Chandra Deo.

A final decision is likely to be announced on February 23, just before the economic survey will be presented.

The ice was broken, apparently, after finance minister Pranab Mukherjee had a one-to-one meeting with NDA chairman and senior BJP leader LK Advani at latter's residence a week ago.

Sonia Gandhi and Pranab Mukherjee will identify the chairman and convey to the speaker Meira Kumar. She in turn will also have   a consultations with chairman of Rajya Sabha Hamid Ansari. The total number of Members of JPC will be 21. if earlier JPCs are to be taken the calculation is that 14 Lok Sabha and 7 Rajya Sabha MPs will form the part of the JPC.

The chairman of  the JPC normally goes to Lok Sabha member of the ruling party.

Indications available point to the likelihood of keeping AIADMK out of the JPC as they do not pass the qualifying cut off number of 27 MPs. In other words, whichever political parties have 27 MPs as a group they will be given one Member of the JPC. But highly placed sources indicate that Congress might give one of its berths to DMK.

The Congress core group on Monday decided to concede the opposition's demand for a joint parliamentary committee (JPC) probe into the 2G scam and Andhra Congress MP V Kishore Chandra Deo, who turns 64 on Tuesday, is tipped to head the 21-member committee.

Prime minister Manmohan Singh and finance minister Pranab Mukherjee, who attended the core group meeting besides Sonia Gandhi, her political secretary Ahmed Patel and defence minister A K Antony, will be briefing the cabinet on Tuesday to take into confidence the allies in the government, a top Congress source said.

He said the PM was earlier reluctant to have a JPC as that may throw dirt on him and his government, but he was reconciled at the meeting after persuation by Mukherjee who also said he had promised the opposition called over lunch last week to get back to them after a final view emerges on the issue.

In the previous term of the Lok Sabha, Deo, a 5-time Lok Sabha member from Araku ST and once a Rajya Sabha member as also a former union minister of state, has been chairman of the committees constituted by then speaker Somnath Chatterjee to probe misconduct of MPs like taking money to ask questions as also the money allegedly paid to three BJP MPs to vote for government on the confidence vote. Deo is currently chairman of the Parliamentary Committee on Public Undertakings. There will be 14 members from Lok Sabha, including Deo, and seven from the Rajya Sabha in the JPC.

Mukherjee is convening a meeting of the opposition leaders in a day or two to take them on board with a commitment on the JPC as a part of the Congress-led UPA government's strategy to have a smooth run of the Parliament budget session beginning on February 21. The core group authorised him to give a word to the Opposition to ensure it does not resume blockage of the sittings to press for the JPC demand that resulted in the washout of the entire winter session.

At the AICC Press briefing, party spokesman Manish Tewari said the Congress was not averse to the JPC but the opposition should agree to the probe modalities and a prior debate. Admitting that it is for the government as well as the opposition to work out how to run the democratic institutions, he said: "Opposition should not run away from a debate. The demand for a joint parliamentary committee probe should not become a subterfuge to run away from debate. Debate on the floor of the House is a fair, legitimate and just demand."

Congress may press for the JPC probe to cover the mobile phone licences and spectrum allocations right from 2001 to cover the period when late Pramod Mahajan and Arun Shourie of the BJP were the telecom ministers. The probe will also cover DMK's former telecom ministers Dayanidhi Maran and A Raja.

Meanwhile, Lok Sabha speaker Meira Kumar has convened a meeting of all political parties on Sunday on the eve of the three-month long Budget session to make it a smooth affair.