Lok Sabha Elections: PM Modi to contest from Varanasi, Amit Shah replaces Advani; BJP first list out
New Delhi : Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Thursday launched its first list of candidates for the upcoming Lok Sabha Polls. Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be contesting from Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh.
BJP president Amit Shah will be replacing LK Advani on Gandhinagar seat in Gujarat. Mr Advani's name has not been announced in the first list of candidates.
In the first list, BJP has announced the names of 184 candidates.
Union ministers Rajnath Singh and Nitin Gadkari will contest from Lucknow and Nagpur respectively. Both leaders had won from these seats in the last general election.
Union minister Smriti Irani will take on Congress president Rahul Gandhi for the second time, as she contests from Amethi. In the 2014 polls, she lost to Mr Gandhi from his bastion, but managed to reduce his winning margin.
Minister VK Singh will fight from Ghaziabad, parliamentarian Hema Malini from her existing constituency Mathura and Sakshi Maharaj will contest from Unnao.
Union Minister Babul Supriyo will fight to retain his Asanol seat, where he will face Trinamool Congress's Moon Moon Sen. The BJP has also fielded Bengali film actress Locket Chatterjee from Hooghly.
BJP's Kerala strongman Kummanam Rajasekharan, who recently quit as Mizoram Governor, will fight against Congress's Shashi Tharoor in Thiruvanthapuram, while Union Minister KJ Alphons will contest from Ernakulam.
The BJP also fielded its Tamil Nadu unit chief Tamilisai Soundararajan from Thoothukudi from where DMK's K Kanimozhi is contesting.
Mr Nadda, who had announced that Minister of State from Home Kiren Rijiju will contest from Arunanchal East, later corrected himself, saying he would be contesting from Arunachal West.
The BJP also fielded Baijayant 'Jay' Panda, who had quit Odisha's ruling Biju Janata Dal to join it, from Kendrapara.
In Rajasthan, former chief minister Vasundhara Raje will not contest the polls, rather her son Dushyant will fight for the fourth time.
28 names each have been announced for Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal, 21 Karnataka, 16 Maharashtra, 16 Rajasthan, 13 Kerala, 10 Odisha, 10 Telangana, 8 Assam, 5 Tamil Nadu, 5 Chhattisgarh, 5 Jammu and Kashmir, 5 Uttarakhand, 2 Arunachal, 2 Tripura, 2 Andhra Pradesh, 1 Gujarat, 1 Sikkim, 1 Mizoram, 1 Lakshwadeep and 1 Dadra and Nagar Haveli.
