Congress general secretary (organisation) KC Venugopal announced the second list of 88 candidates…reports Asian Lite News
Four day after releasing 144 candidates, the Congress on Thursday released its second list for November 17 Madhya Pradesh Assembly elections. The Congress has given tickets to 41 new faces and five BJP turncoats in its second list.
Congress general secretary (organisation) KC Venugopal announced the second list of 88 candidates.
Even three candidates were replaced from the previous list.
The party has named Dinesh Gurjar from Morena assembly seat, Ravindra Singh Tomar from Dimani, Sunil Sharma from Gwalior, Pankaj Laneria from Guna (SC) seat.
The party has now named Rajendra Bharti in place of Awadhesh Nayak from Datia, Arvind Singh Lodhi in place of Shailendra Singh from Pichhore, Narada Prasad Prajapati in place of Shekhar Chaudhary from Gotegaon SC seat.
Former BJP MLA Abhay Mishra, who has been making headlines for his frequent party hopping, has been fielded from the Semaria seat, which he lost in 2018 to BJP’s K.P. Tripathi with a close margin.
At least five BJP leaders, who shifted to the Congress in the past few months, managed to get tickets. These are — Deepak Joshi, the son of former Chief Minister Kailash Joshi from Khategaon seat of Khandwa district, Abhishek Choukase (Jabalpur Cant) , Bhavar Singh Shekhawat (Badnvar), Samandar Patel (Javad) and Girjashankar Sharma (Hoshangabad).
Earlier on Thursday, state unit chief Kamal Nath had met Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, a day after two rounds of the CWC meeting to finalise the candidates.
The Congress has already named 144 candidates for 230 member assembly on Sunday, which included the names of Kamal Nath from Chhindwara assembly seat, senior party leader Digvijaya Singh’s son Jaivardhan Singh from Raghogarh assembly seat.
The Congress has fielded actor Vikram Mastal, who played Lord Hanuman’s role in Anand Sagar’s 2008 TV show Ramayana, against CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan from Budhni seat, while Sanjay Shukla will be contesting the election against BJP’s national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya from Indore 1.
Leader of Opposition (LoP) Govind Singh has been fielded from Lahar assembly seat and former LoP Ajay Singh (Rahul) from Churhat in Sidhi district.
The Congress has fielded Avdhes Nayak against the state home minister Narottam Mishra from Datia seat. The Congress has fielded senior party leader Ramkishor Dange against state agriculture minister Kamal Patel from Dhar assembly constituency.
Former minister Jitu Patwari has been given ticket from Rau seat of Indore district, while the party has fielded former Union minister Kantilal Bhuria’s son Vikrant Bhuria from Jhabua seat.
Out of 144 candidates in the first list, the Congress has fielded 47 general candidates and 39 OBC candidates.
