National
BJP announces first list, talks with RLD inconclusive
By Our Special Correspondent
NEW DELHI, JAN 16. The BJP's Central Election Committee announced its first list of candidates for the coming Assembly polls and by-elections, even as its seat-sharing talks with its major ally in Uttar Pradesh, the Rashtriya Lok Dal, remained inconclusive.
The party will be contesting 23 Assembly segments in Punjab, the same as five years ago, in alliance with its senior partner in the alliance, the Shiromani Akali Dal. The list of all the 23 candidates has been finalised and declared.
Of the sitting MLAs of the party, all but three have been given the tickets again. In Manipur, where the party will be contesting on its own, it has declared a list of 48 candidates. In the rest of the 12 seats it would be announcing support for `other' candidates at a later stage.
Final decisions on some important by-elections have also been taken: Eeshwarappa will be the candidate for the Kanakapura Lok Sabha seat in Karnataka; in Guna, Madhya Pradesh, the party candidate will be Deshraj Singh Yadav, an MLA from an Assembly segment under that Parliamentary seat where a vacancy was caused by the death of Congress leader, Madhavrao Scindia. Of course, in this constituency, several BJP leaders admitted, the Congress candidate, Jyotiraditya Scindia, Madhavrao Scindia's son and Congress candidate, could easily ride the sympathy wave. The BJP candidate for the Tripura West Lok Sabha seat will be Supratim S Sen.
The Gujarat Chief Minister, Narendra Modi, will seek election from Rajkot II which was vacated for him by the Finance Minister of the State, Vajubhai Wala. Jitendra Sukhadia is the candidate for the Syajiganj Assembly segment and Manubhai Amtabhai Patel from the Mahua Assembly seat.
Today for nearly two and a half hours the U.P. Chief Minister, Rajnath Singh, State unit president, Kalraj Mishra, and State Minister, Lalji Tandon, held seat sharing talks with RLD leader and Cabinet Minister, Ajit Singh. It seems that the RLD leader was adamant that all the five Assembly segments under Baghpat, the Parliamentary seat represented by him, should go to him. The BJP was not willing to let go of the Khekra Assembly segment where it has a sitting MLA.
It seems that already 35 Assembly segments have been cleared for the RLD which is hoping to clinch the issue at about 45, but more than numbers, Mr. Ajit Singh seems to have made Khekra a prestige issue, and could go to the Prime Minister, if necessary, to have his way. The talks between the BJP and RLD will continue tomorrow.
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
National
|
