BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, party president Rajnath Singh, senior leaders Murli Manohar Joshi and Arun Jailtely figure in the fourth list of 98 candidates for the Lok Sabha polls.
The list was finalized at a marathon meeting of party's central election committee in New Delhi last night. Modi will contest from Varanasi seat in Uttar Pradesh and senior party leader and sitting Varanasi MP Murli Manohar Joshi has been shifted to Kanpur. Rajnath Singh will contest from Lucknow.
Releasing the list, party general secretary Ananth Kumar told reporters that Arun Jaitley has been fielded from Amritsar seat in Punjab, while actor-turned-politician Shatrughan Sinha from Patna Saheb. Varun Gandhi will contest from Sultanpur and Maneka Gandhi from Pilibhit.
Former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Uma Bharti has been given ticket from Jhansi and former Mumbai Police Commissioner Satyapal Singh from Baghpat in Uttar Pradesh.
Delhi BJP chief Harsh Vardhan will fight from Chandni Chowk, party spokesperson Meenakshi Lekhi from New Delhi and Bhojpuri singer Manoj Tiwari from North Eest Delhi.
Other BJP candidates from Delhi are dalit leader Udit Raj from North West Delhi, Pravesh Verma from West Delhi, Ramesh Bidhuri from South Delhi and Mahesh Giri from East Delhi.
Actress-turned-politician Kirron Kher will contest from Chandigarh against Congress' Pawan Kumar Bansal, former Union Minister in the UPA government Rao Inderjit Singh, who recently joined BJP, has been fielded from his constituency Gurgaon in Haryana.
In Uttarakhand, the party fielded three former Chief Ministers, Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank from Haridwar, B C Khanduri from Pauri Garhwal and Bhagat Singh Koshiyari from Nainital.
Altogether 55 names were cleared for Uttar Pradesh, 11 for Chhattisgarh, 7 each for Haryana and Delhi, five for Uttarakhand, four for Odisha, two each for Punjab and Bihar, one each for Sikkim, Assam, Chandigarh, Arunachal Pradesh and Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
Asked whether Modi could contest from Gujarat also, Ananth Kumar said, there is every possibility. He said the list for Gujarat would be finalised on Wednesday, when the seat for senior leader L K Advani will also be announced.
Our correspondent reports that with this the party has announced names of 301 party candidates for the Lok Sabha polls.
