The ruling BJP late Wednesday released its third and final list of candidates for the Haryana polls as it denied ticket to its senior leader Ram Bilas Sharma from Mahendragarh.
According to the party list, BJP has fielded Kanwar Singh Yadav from Mahendragarh, even as Sharma, sensing that the party may deny him a ticket, filed his nomination papers from the constituency earlier in the day.
From Sirsa, the party has fielded Rohtash Jangra while from Faridabad NIT, the BJP has named Satish Fagna as its candidate.
Sirsa is currently represented by BJP’s ally Gopal Kanda, who heads the Haryana Lokhit Party.
With this, the BJP has named candidates for all the 90 assembly seats.
Mr Sharma is a prominent Brahmin face of the party, who was also a Minister in the government headed by M L Khattar between 2014 and 2019. However, Mr Sharma lost the 2019 Assembly polls. He has also served as the BJP’s Haryana unit president.
The BJP has denied tickets to a few of its sitting MLAs, including a couple of ministers.
Amid deepening schisms within the ruling BJP in Haryana over poll ticket distribution, party leader Karan Dev Kamboj on Wednesday indicated that the rebellion could have been prevented if Chief Minister Nayab Saini had a “say” in the allocation process.
The BJP on Tuesday released its second list of candidates for the polls, denying tickets to two ministers and replacing its nominee for the Pehowa seat.
In its first list of candidates announced on September 4, the BJP nominated Kamaljeet Singh Ajrana for the Pehowa seat but replaced him with Jai Bhagwan Sharma in the second list.
Incumbent MLA of Pehowa and former minister Sandeep Singh has been denied re-nomination.
The BJP also denied a ticket to Minister Banwari Lal, who represented Bawal in the outgoing Assembly, and fielded Krishna Kumar in his place.
School Education Minister Seema Trikha, the incumbent MLA of Badhkal, too was denied re-nomination. Dhanesh Adlakha has been nominated for the seat.
The BJP released its first list of 67 candidates for the 90-member Assembly on September 4, fielding Haryana chief minister Saini from the Ladwa seat and rewarding several recent entrants to the party with poll tickets.
Shruti Choudhry, the grand-daughter of former chief minister Bansi Lal, who joined the ruling party recently, is contesting from the Tosham.
After the BJP announced its first list of 67 candidates, it faced rebellion within its ranks with Minister Ranjit Singh Chautala and MLA Lakshman Dass Napa quitting the party after being denied a ticket.
A few other aspirants who were also denied tickets had raised a banner of revolt. The BJP is aiming for a hattrick in the Haryana Assembly polls to be held on October 5 but faces a tough challenge from a resurgent Congress which is looking to cash in on the anti-incumbency factor.
Mr Saini is the BJP’s chief ministerial face for the assembly polls. The counting of votes will take place on October 8.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
