Among the surprises in BJP's fifth list are actors Kangana Ranaut, Arun Govil and Rekha Patra, reportedly a victim of the trouble-torn West Bengal town of Sandeshkhali.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Sunday released its fifth list of 111 candidates for the Lok Sabha elections 2024, fielding many first-timers and dropping several incumbent MPs like Union Minister Ashwini Kumar Choubey, VK Singh and Varun Gandhi.
The fifth BJP candidate list for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls featured actors Kangana Ranaut and Arun Govil as well.
While BJP denied poll ticket from Pilibhit to Varun Gandhi - a three-term Lok Sabha MP who has often been vocal about views deemed critical of his party's governments at the Centre and in the state - the party renominated his mother Maneka Gandhi from Sultanpur.
The Pilibhit Lok Sabha seat has been represented by Varun Gandhi or his mother Maneka Gandhi for over two decades. Varun Gandhi had first won the Pilibhit seat in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections on a BJP ticket. He was succeeded by Maneka Gandhi in 2014 and went on to again win the seat in 2019 general polls.
Before the BJP released its fifth list, there were speculation that Varun Gandhi might contest as an independent candidate in case he is not given a ticket to contest from Pilibhit constituency.
Reports also suggested that Varun Gandhi would contest the Lok Sabha elections 2024 either as an independent or a Samajwadi Party (SP) candidate, however, the Akhilesh Yadav-led party announced Bhagwat Sharan Gangwar as the candidate from Pilibhit on March 20.
Earlier this month, a new agency PTI report had mentioned that Varun Gandhi's representatives brought four sets of nomination papers for the Pilibhit seat in Uttar Pradesh. Varun Gandhi's spokesperson MR Malik said on the MP's directions, he has purchased four sets of nomination papers — two in Hindi and two in English.
The BJP sprung a surprise with its fifth of Lok Sabha candidates, which included names for West Bengal. The BJP fielded a protester from Sandeshkhali for the Basirhat constituency and changed the seats of its two incumbent MPs -- party's former state chief Dilip Ghosh and ex-Union minister Debasree Chowdhury.
Sandeshkhali 'Victim' Fielded: Rekha Patra, a housewife from the troubled region of Sandeshkhali, has been nominated for the Basirhat seat by the BJP. The candidature of Patra, reportedly a victim of torture by now-suspended TMC leader Shajahan Sheikh and his associates, comes as a strong statement on the part of the BJP in support of the women of Sandeshkhali and West Bengal.
Ex-Calcutta HC Judge: Former Calcutta High Court judge Abhijit Ganguly, who joined the BJP recently, was nominated from the Tamluk Lok Sabha seat, a stronghold of BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari and his family.
Barrackpore MP Arjun Singh, who returned to the BJP this month after defecting to the Trinamool Congress (TMC) two years ago, was re-nominated from the same seat.
The BJP named 19 candidates from West Bengal in the list released on Sunday, taking the total number of its nominees announced for West Bengal so far to 38. The state sends 42 MPs to the Lok Sabha.
BJP fielded actors Kangana Ranaut and Arun Govil for the Lok Sabha elections 2024. Kangana Ranaut, a vocal supporter of the BJP, will contest from Mandi in her home state of Himachal Pradesh.
Veteran actor Arun Govil, famed for his role of Lord Ram in the popular TV serial "Ramayan", has been preferred to seasoned parliamentarian Rajendra Agrawal in Meerut by the ruling party.
Meanwhile, the BJP has denied tickets to nearly 37 incumbent MPs in the latest list, including nine in Uttar Pradesh, five in Gujarat, four in Odisha and three each in Bihar, Karnataka and Jharkhand.
A couple of leaders who quit different parties to join the BJP also featured in the fifth list, including industrialist Naveen Jindal and Varaprasad Rao, who were inducted hours before the list was released. Sita Soren, Tapas Roy and N Kiran Kumar Reddy have also been fielded for the Lok Sabha polls by the BJP.
Sita Soren, the sister-in-law of former Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren, is the BJP's candidate from Dumka. She had quit the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha a few days ago.
(With PTI inputs)