MP Assembly Polls 2018: Vajpayee’s nephew in BJP’s second list of 17 candidates

The second list was released in New Delhi by Union Minister J P Nadda, who is also secretary of the BJP’s Central Election Committee.

The BJP on November 5 declared its second list of 17 candidates for the November 28 assembly polls in Madhya Pradesh, fielding Lok Sabha member Anoop Mishra, who is the nephew of former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, and two women nominees.

With this, the ruling party has so far announced 194 candidates in the state, which has a total of 230 assembly seats. The first list was released last November 2.

The second list was released in New Delhi by Union Minister J P Nadda, who is also secretary of the BJP’s Central Election Committee.

Mishra, the Lok Sabha MP from Morena, will contest from Bhitarwar in Gwalior district. He had unsuccessfully fought the 2013 assembly polls from the same constituency.

In 2014, he won from the Morena Lok Sabha seat.

The BJP has fielded Nirmala Bhuriya, daughter of former MP and tribal leader Dilip Singh Bhuriya, from Petlawad (ST) in Jhabua district.

In 2015, she had lost the bypoll from Jhabua-Ratlam Lok Sabha constituency, which fell vacant following the death of her father.

The second woman in the list, Leena Jain, has been nominated from Basoda in Vidisha district.

The list also contains the names of some sitting MLAs, including Sharad Jain (Jabalpur North), who is also a minister.

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It’s ‘one family, one ticket’ as BJP fields kin of senior leaders in MP

Faced with anti-incumbency and pressure from its leaders, BJP has done a tight-rope walk between changing sitting MLAs in its candidates’ list and accommodating the kin of those who have the potential to defeat the official nominee in case their wishes are not fulfilled.

Two such names figured in the third list of candidates for Madhya Pradesh Assembly elections released on Thursday, a day before the last date of nominations. The ego tussles between its top leaders in the state has led to the delay in declaration of names. BJP national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya’s son Akash will be the BJP candidate from Indore-3 seat. His name was finalised after some bad blood within the party.

Vijayvargiya had issued a statement a day before the announcement that Akash will win from whichever seat he contests the election, thus throwing a virtual challenge to the party leadership. The candidature of Akash was held up as Lok Sabha speaker and Indore MP Sumitra Mahajan wanted her son Mandaar also to be fielded from one of the Indore seats but this was not acceptable to the party. Since she was away on an official visit to Argentina, senior party leaders met Mahajan when she returned on November 5 to discuss the issue. She has, however, denied that she ever wanted a ticket for her son.

Former chief minister Babulal Gaur’s daughter-in-law Krishna will contest from Govindpura seat. Gaur had quit the Shivraj Singh Chouhan cabinet some years ago after he crossed the 75-year age cut-off.

Congress leader Prem Chandra Guddu, who has switched over to the BJP, is also said to be in talks for a ticket for his son Ajit.

In most cases where BJP has denied tickets to sitting MLAs, it has accommodated a kin of the outgoing legislator. Lakshminarayan Yadav’s son Sudhir Yadav has been fielded from Surkhi seat.
Similarly, sons of ministers Gauri Shankar Sejwal and Harsh Singh are in the fray in their place.

Union minister Narendra Singh Tomar reportedly wants his son Devendra to be fielded from one of the seats in Gwalior which he represents in the Lok Sabha.

Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has been asked by the central leadership to pander to the wishes of some of the leaders he is not on good terms as not doing so may cost the BJP these seats. Chouhan’s brother-in-law Sanjay Singh Mesani joined the Congress and has been given the ticket from Wara Seoni seat.
Mahajan has also taken a backseat as Vijayvargiya has managed to get the ticket to his followers in Indore. Similarly, some of the candidates in Tomar’s area are not from his camp though he has been entrusted with the task of ensuring BJP candidates in the region win their seats. Meanwhile, BJP leader Sartaj Singh joined Congress on Thursday as he was not fielded by his party. Congress has given him the ticket from Hoshangabad.

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Congress releases third list of candidates for Chhattisgarh polls; party banking on old and new faces to regain power

The Congress is banking on a combination of new faces and old-timers in ticket distribution to end its 15-year wait to rule Chhattisgarh, which goes to polls next month.

The Opposition party, late on Saturday evening, released a list of candidates — its third — for 37 Assembly seats going to polls in the second and last phase of voting on 20 November. It has renominated 15 sitting MLAs and fielded 11 candidates who had lost in 2013, besides giving tickets to 11 fresh faces.

No sitting MLA was denied a ticket in the third list. However, only three women figure in it.

A Congress leader said the party is ensuring that representation is given to all sections of society. “It is a completely balanced list wherein the party has given representation to leaders belonging to all sections of society,” claimed the head of the Chhattisgarh Congress communication wing, Shailesh Nitin Trivedi.

“Candidates were selected on the basis of the party’s survey and performances of leaders,” he said, adding that it is a “well-planned strategy” to win the upcoming election.

The two lists released earlier contained 18 names. With this, the Opposition party has, so far, announced 55 candidates in BJP-ruled Chhattisgarh, which has a 90-member House.

State Congress chief Bhupesh Baghel (Patan seat), Congress Legislative Party leader TS Singhdeo (Ambikapur), senior Congress leader Satyanarayan Sharma (Raipur Rural) and prominent tribal leader Amarjeet Bhagat (Sitapur) were among the sitting MLAs who were given tickets.

In the last Assembly polls, 26 Congress sitting MLAs, including prominent leaders like Rampukar Singh, Ravindra Choubey, Amitesh Shukla and Mohammad Akbar, had tasted defeat. This time, Singh (Pathalgaon-ST), Shukla (Rajim), Akbar (Kawardha) and Choubey (Saja) have been renominated from their respective seats.

Chhattisgarh Congress working president Shiv Kumar Dahariya, who had lost the previous election from Bilaigarh (SC), has been fielded from Arang (SC) this time. Similarly, Guru Rudra Kumar, who had lost the 2013 election from Arang, has been given a ticket from Ahiwara (SC).

A popular young Congress leader, Vikas Upadhyay, who had lost to BJP minister Rajesh Munat from Raipur West last time by a margin of 6,160 votes, has been renominated from the seat. He will take on Munat again.

Among other leaders who have been given tickets despite losing the 2013 polls are Premsai Tekam (Pratappur) and Pratima Chandrakar (Durg Rural).

Vinay Kumar Bhagat and Uttamdan Minj, who had lost the 2008 Assembly election from Jashpur and Kunkuri, respectively, have been fielded from the same seats this time. Vinay Jaiswal, an eye surgeon, Devendra Yadav, Ramkumar Yadav are among the fresh faces fielded by the party this time.

Bhilai Municipal Corporation Mayor Devendra Yadav, a youth leader, has been fielded from the Bhilai Nagar seat, where he will take on state minister and sitting BJP MLA Premprakash Pandey. Jaiswal will contest from Manendragarh.

Ramkumar Yadav, a prominent farmer leader, had contested from Chandrapur constituency as a Bahujan Samaj Party candidate in 2013 and had finished runner-up. He recently joined the Congress, which has given him ticket from Chandrapur.

Voting in Chhattisgarh will be held in two phases — on 12 November and 20 November — and counting will take place on 11 December.

The first phase covers 18 seats spread across eight naxal-affected districts — Bastar, Bijapur, Dantewada, Sukma, Kondagaon, Kanker, Narayanpur and Rajnandgaon. The remaining 72 seats will see polling on 20 November.

The ruling BJP has so far announced 78 candidates.

In 2013, the BJP had won 49, the Congress 39, the BSP 1 and an Independent 1.

The BJP has been ruling the tribal-dominated state, which came into existence in November 2000, since 2003 under the leadership of Raman Singh.

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Chhattisgarh polls: CPI surprises by announcing 5 candidates’ names

It was being said that the CPI was given just two seats after it joined the grand alliance between the JCC and Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) for the elections. It was agreed that the CPI would field candidates from the two seats of Dantewada and Konta and in lieu of that, the Left party and its affiliated labour unions would campaign for the JCC-BSP candidates in some constituencies. However, the CPI’s announcement of five candidates now has raised fresh questions.

The five candidates that the CPI have announced are: Mangal Ram Kashyap from Jagdalpur; Ramchandra Nag from Kondagaon; Radhika Sori from Keshkala; Nandram Sori from Dantewada and Manish Kunjam from Kota, said a report in Naidunia. Chhattisgarh will go to elections on November 12 and 20 and the counting of the votes will take place on December 11. Four other states – Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Mizoram and Telangana are also going to polls around the same time.

In the 2013 elections, the CPI contested in 13 seats but failed to win a single seat. It polled over 86,000 votes and had a vote share of 0.7 per cent. The figure was worse than its show in the 2008 and 2003 elections respectively when it got 1.1 per cent vote share. It though failed to win a single seat on both those occasions.

Can the CPI gain from Mayawati and Jogi magic given the fact that everything is fine with its alliance with the BSP-JCC tie-up?

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Telangana Elections: TRS announces candidates for Malakpet and Zaheerabad

With this, the TRS has announced 107 candidates for the 119-member Assembly. The remaining 12 candidates are also expected to be named soon.

The Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) on Sunday announced the names of two more party candidates for the Malakpet and Zaheerabad Assembly constituencies for the upcoming state elections.

The decision was taken by senior TRS leaders after a meeting of all candidates with caretaker Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao on Sunday. While Chava Satish Kumar has been picked for Malakpet, K Manik Rao will contest from Zaheerabad on the TRS flag.

With this, the TRS has announced 107 candidates for the 119-member Assembly. The remaining 12 candidates are also expected to be named soon.

On September 6, KCR and his cabinet passed a resolution to dissolve the Assembly which came into effect after Governor ESL Narasimhan approved it. On the same day, almost all sitting legislators of the TRS were given a ticket to contest the polls yet again.

Only two MLAs were not given a ticket again — the Chennur seat in Mancherial district and Andole in Sangareddy district. “In five places, some discussion is still needed, so the candidates have not been announced yet. This includes Medchal, Malkajgiri, Choppadandi, Vikarabad and Warangal East,” KCR had said.

KCR himself has decided to recontest from his present seat at Gajwel, while his son and IT Minister KT Rama Rao will contest again from Sircilla constituency. Irrigation Minister Harish Rao retained his nomination for the seat from Siddipet.

While the TRS won 63 seats out of the total 119 in the legislative assembly during the 2014 elections, it presently has close to 90 MLAs in its party following a series of defections. In what could be seen as a gamble, many defectors have managed to retain their ticket and will contest the same seats, this time under the TRS banner.

Meanwhile, a team from the Central Election Commission is all set to visit Telangana on Monday and review poll preparedness of the state for the elections to be held on December 7.

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BJP Releases List of 77 Candidates for Chhattisgarh Polls

The decision was taken after the Central Election Committee (CEC) meeting of the party. Chief Minister Raman Singh is set to contest from Rajnandgaon seat.

The Bharatiya Janata Party released its first list of 77 candidates for the assembly elections in Chhattisgarh on Saturday and announced to contest polls on 38 out of 119 seats in Telangana.

Among the 77 candidates announced out of a total of 90 Assembly segments, 14 are women candidates and 14 sitting MLAs have been replaced with new names, Union minister J P Nadda said. The list was finalised at the BJP’s central election committee meeting that was chaired by party president Amit Shah and attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi among others.

Among those fielded by the BJP include former IAS officer O P Chaudhary and tribal leader Ramdayal Uike, who recently left the Congress and joined the BJP.

Announcing the list, Telangana BJP election in-charge Nadda further said that BJP will also contest Mizoram Assembly elections on 13 seats.

Eighteen naxal-affected constituencies will go to polls in the first phase on November 12, while the rest of the 72 constituencies would go to polls in the second phase on November 20.

Earlier in the day, Mayawati-led Bahujan Samaj Party had also released its second list of 12 candidates. The party has forged an alliance with former chief minister Ajit Jogi’s Janata Congress Chhattisgarh (J) and the Communist Party of India, and will contest 33 Assembly seats.

Meanwhile, nine more candidates have filed nomination papers for the first phase of Chhattisgarh polls. This takes the number of candidates who have filed their papers to 11.

On Saturday, two candidates each filed their papers for Rajnandgaon, Antagarh and Dantewada seats and one each for Khairagarh, Dongargarh and Dongargaon, an official said.

For Dantewada seat, Congress’s Devti Karma and Communist Party of India’s (CPI) Nanda Ram Sori filed their papers. Karma is the sitting Congress MLA from Dantewada. Others who filed nomination papers Saturday included Dinesh Singh (Shiv Sena) from Khairagarh and Rajkumar Sahu (Shiv Sena) from Dongargaon.

Nominations cannot be filed on Sunday, it being holiday, so only two days — October 22 and 23 — are now left for filing of nominations for the first phase, the official said.

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BJP may drop over half of its MLAs in Rajasthan to counter anti-incumbency

In an unprecedented move, BJP is contemplating dropping more than half its sitting MLAs in Rajasthan to cushion its prospects in the assembly polls from the discontent against incumbent legislators. Well-placed party sources said 80-100 of the 160 sitting MLAs might be replaced in what could arguably be the biggest-ever political culling of incumbent MLAs belonging to any party.

The party move is also to send a message to lawmakers in other states as well as members of Lok Sabha about the risk of being dropped on the basis of feedback about their performance which is being gathered, apart from traditional channels, through PM Modi’s Namo app. The app is being increasingly used by people to give feedback on the performance of their representatives directly to the PM. “Voters could be revengeful as a large number of MLAs continued passing the buck and didn’t serve the electorate as per expectations,” said a source privy to the decision to replace a majority of sitting MLA .

Sources said the party will field young first-time candidates to stem anti-incumbency as new faces, who have been involved in serving the people for years, can water down the anger among people and assure them of a better performance. Performance is a major issue in BJP deciding new candidates but changing caste equations in the state are an equally important factor to replace existing MLAs.

The Rajput community, traditional BJP supporters, seems to be drifting towards Congress whereas the Meenas in eastern Rajasthan are veering towards BJP after community leader Kirori Lal joined the party recently and was made Rajya Sabha MP. Among the three-poll bound states ruled by BJP, the party is said to be struggling the most in Rajasthan thanks to the state’s over three-decade trend of changing the government every five years.

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MP polls: BJP might not give tickets to 70-80 MLAs

The ruling BJP is thinking of not giving tickets to 70-80 MLAs, including some ministers, for the forthcoming Assembly polls in order to tide over anti-incumbency, a party leader said Friday.

Assembly polls in the state are scheduled for November 28 and counting of votes will take place on December 11.

“The party is seriously toying with the idea of not giving tickets to 70-80 MLAs and ministers,” a state BJP leader told PTI Friday.

He added that the ruling BJP came up with this idea following reports of public outrage against some MLAs.

Party sources said that MP Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who has been touring the state as part of his Jan Ashirwad Yatra, was receiving complaints about non-performing MLAs.

Besides, a recent opinion poll, which showed the Congress returning to power in MP after a gap of 15 years, has also prompted the BJP to set its house in order, they said.

“There is public outrage against some MLAs but not against Chief Minister Chouhan, who still remains popular with the masses,” a Bharatiya Janta Yuva Morcha (BJYM) functionary said.

He said that the BJP stood a good chance of retaining power if new faces are given a chance.

The BJP, in the 2013 Assembly polls, had given about 25 per cent tickets to new faces and 75 per cent of them emerged victorious.

In the 2013 Assembly polls, the BJP had won 165 seats in the 230-member House. The Congress got 58 seats, the BSP four and one seat was won by an Independent.

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Rajasthan Polls 2018: Sensing good show, Congress sitting MPs join ticket queue

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Top Congress leaders in Rajasthan are vying for tickets anticipating a ‘good performance’ by their party in the upcoming assembly elections. Even those who had contested the parliamentary polls earlier are pushing for their candidature. One of the two current Lok Sabha MPs from Congress has also indicated his willingness to try his luck in the polls.

“It would be a party decision. I am ready for whatever the party asks me to do,” he said.

Congress had drawn a blank in the 2014 general elections from Rajasthan. Later, Karan Singh Yadav won from Alwar and Raghu Sharma from Ajmer.

“It was after these bypoll victories that the Congress has come into the reckoning. Now, Rajasthan is the best bet for the party’s revival,” said a senior Congress functionary.

Political analysts feel that the rush for Congress tickets this time is due to the suspense over the chief ministerial candidate.

“Had the party declared the CM face, like BJP has done by projecting Vasundhara Raje, other senior Congress leaders would not have shown so much of interest,” said Ram Pratap Singh, a political analyst.

In 2013, Congress had fought by projecting the then chief minister Ashok Gehlot as the CM candidate. That time, most of the senior leaders contested the Lok Sabha elections giving the assembly polls a miss, which were held about six months before the 2014 LS elections.

“Party stalwarts Sachin Pilot, Jitendra Singh, CP Joshi, Girija Vyas, Mahesh Joshi, Namo Narayan Meena and Ijyaraj Singh, among others, unsuccessfully contested the elections then. Now, focus is on the state assembly polls where dislodging Raje looks more “doable” than engaging in the “complicated” 2019 general elections,” he said.

Earlier in 2008, CP Joshi, the then state party chief, was slated to become the chief minister (though not declared).

But he lost the election by a solitary vote and Ashok Gehlot was given the responsibility

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