The Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday fielded four of its sitting MPs from Delhi for the Lok Sabha election scheduled for May 12.
Union Minister Harsh Vardhan, Delhi BJP chief and one of the party’s star campaigners Manoj Tiwari, Pravesh Verma and Ramesh Bidhuri have been fielded from the Chandni Chowk, North-East, West and South Delhi constituencies, respectively.
Other seats
Party insiders claimed that the names of the remaining candidates — to be fielded from the North-West, East and New Delhi seats, where AAP and Congress may contest the Lok Sabha poll together — were deliberately withheld as the BJP is awaiting clarity on the proposed alliance between AAP and the Congress.
“We will field sitting MPs on the remaining three seats if there is no alliance; if the alliance does go through, fresh faces are more than likely to be fielded,” the leader added.
According to party sources, the BJP is likely to replace sitting New Delhi, East and North-West MPs Meenakshi Lekhi, Maheish Girri and Udit Raj, respectively, with former India cricketer Gautam Gambhir, East Delhi MLA Om Prakash Sharma and senior party leader Anita Arya, respectively.
Nomination date
“The party is willing to wait even till Tuesday, the last day for filing of nominations,” a party source said.
Dr. Vardhan, Mr. Tiwari, and Mr. Verma will file their nomination papers on Monday. Mr. Bidhuri will do so on Tuesday, the party said.
Of the three main parties in Delhi, AAP has declared the names for all the seven seats while the Congress is yet to announce its candidates. Both the parties are engaged in hectic parleys on a pre-poll tie-up to avoid division of votes.