Gujarat: BJP names candidates for 6 Lok Saba seats, picks five new faces

TNN | Mar 25, 2024, 09.53 AM IST
Gujarat: BJP names candidates for 6 Lok Saba seats, picks five new faces
GANDHINAGAR/VADODARA: The central leadership of the BJP on Sunday named candidates for six more Lok Sabha constituencies including Vadodara, Sabarkantha, Mehsana, Surendranagar, Junagadh and Amreli.
Of the six, five are new faces. Only one MP, Rajesh Chudasama, has been repeated from the Junagadh seat. With this, the BJP has now nominated candidates for all 26 seats in Gujarat.
The party nominated Hemang Joshi for the Vadodara seat after sitting MP Ranjan Bhatt withdrew her candidature on Saturday over widespread discontentment within the party. Joshi is a physiotherapist and an HR professional who was recently elected as the vice-chairman of the municipal school board of the Vadodara Municipal Corporation. This is the first major post that he has been assigned. Joshi is among the youngest persons to be fielded by the party on the seat.
Bhatt’s nomination for the third terms was vehementally opposed by the former city mayor Jyoti Pandya as well as within the party ranks.

Similarly, the party named Shobhna Baraiya as its candidate from Sabarkantha after Bhikhaji Thakor withdrew his candidature. Party workers had reportedly made representations to the leadership against his nomination. Baraiya is the wife of former Congress MLA Mahendrasinh Baraiya.
For the Mehsana seat, the party named Haribhai Patel, a member of the Mehsana district panchayat. There were considerable deliberations in the party over the choice for this after former deputy chief minister Nitin Patel announced that he did not intend to contest the parliamentary elections,


Chandubhai Shihora has been named candidate from the Surendranagar seat. An organizational man, Shihora is the former president of the Morbi district panchayat and belongs to the Koli community which has significant numbers in Surendranagar.


In Amreli, the party fielded Bharat Sutariya, the president of the district panchayat. Sutariya, a Leuva Patel, is a resident of Matirala village of Lathi taluka and is associated with farming.



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