BJP fields veteran leaders from Delhi

The Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has nominated Vijay Goel, former union minister, for the prestigious New Delhi Lok Sabha constituency and six other veteran leaders, including former cricketer Chetan Chauhan, for other constituencies in the capital.

BJP also nominated Rama Devi, who had on Wednesday resigned from Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), from Sheohar constituency in Bihar. Rama Devi had resigned in protest against RJD leader Lalu Prasad Yadav’s style. Kirti Azad, former cricketer has been nominated from Dharbanga in Bihar.

Selection of candidates for Delhi was one of the most difficult tasks before the Party’s Central Election Committee headed by Rajnath Singh, BJP chief, in view of party having recently suffered defeat in the Legislative Assembly election at the hands of Congress.

 

The BJP leadership had to finally bow before Goel’s demand that he be shifted to New Delhi and not Chandni Chowk, where he had lost to Kapil Sibal of Congress in 2004.

The CEC, which after a long time was also attended by Arun Jaitley, BJP general secretary, also finalised names of candidates for two key seats in Jammu and Kashmir three each from Gujarat and Bihar.

The Party has picked B L Sharma Prem, a veteran of many elections for North east Delhi, Jagdish Mukhi, leader of opposition in Delhi Legislative Assembly for West Delhi and Ramesh Bidhuri for South Delhi.

Besides, Vijendra Gupta, chief councillor is party’s candidate from Chandni Chowk while Meera Kanwaria, General secretary of BJP Mahila Morcha (women’s wing), would contest from North-West Delhi. In the last election the BJP had won from South Delhi and lost from all other six seats.

In Jammu and Kashmir, the BJP has nominated Leela Karan Sharma, leader of the Shri Amarnath Sangharsh Samiti (SASS), which had led a month long agitation on issue of transfer of land to Amarnath shrine in July-August, for Jammu constituency. Nirmal Singh, former chief of state BJP, has been nominated for Udhampur constituency.

The central leaders have tried to strike a balance between the party candidates and the SASS leaders, who only lately joined the BJP. It was thanks to the SASS campaign that BJP, for the first time, had won 11 seats in the J&K Legislative Assembly.

The party has nominated Dr Sanjay Jaiswal (West Champaran) in Bihar.

BJP list included names of Rajendra Singh Rana (Bhavnagar) Narayanbhai Kachia (Amreili) Somi Damor (Dahod) in Gujarat.