Janjivan Bureau / New Delhi : Bharatiya Janata named its candidates for Dharamsala and Pachhad assembly seats in Himachal, and Phagwara and Mukerain seats in Punjab on Sunday.
BJP will field Rajesh Bagga from the reserved Phagwara seat, and Jangi Lal Mahajan from Mukerian in Punjab. Phagwara’s previous MLA, Som Parkash, was elected into Parliament in May and is currently union minister of state for commerce and industry.
The seat in Mukerian fell vacant after sitting Congress MLA Rajnish Kumar Babbi’s death last month.
Two other seats, Jalalabad and Dakha, will have BJP’s ally Shiromani Akali Dal candidates.
SAD’s Manpreet Singh Ayali will be the alliance’s candidate for Dakha, and Raj Singh Dibbipura will be the candidate for Jalalabad, which fell vacant after Akali chief Sukhbir Singh Badal resigned from the Punjab Assembly following his election to the Lok Sabha from Ferozepur.
In Himachal, BJP will field Vishal Kehriya from Dharamsala and Reena Kashyap from the reserved Pacchad seat in Sirmaur district. Both seats fell vacant after sitting MLAs Kishan Kapoor (Dharamsala) and Suresh Kashyap (Pachhad) were elected to the Lok Sabha.
Both Kashyap and Nehriya are contesting the Vidhan Sabha elections for the first time. While Kashyap is the co-convenor of the IT cell of the state unit of the BJP’s mahila morcha Nehriya is secretary of the state Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM).
Of the 32 Assembly seats for which the BJP declared candidates on Sunday, 10 are in Uttar Pradesh, five in Kerala, four in Assam, two each in Himachal Pradesh, Punjab and Sikkim and one each in Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Meghalaya, Odisha, Rajasthan and Telangana.
By elections for all assembly seats will be held on October 21, along with elections in Haryana and Maharashtra.
Votes for all these elections will be counted on October 24.
BJP’s also announced candidates for four assembly seats in Kerala, four in Assam, one in Bihar, one each in Madhya Pradesh and Meghalaya, and one from Odisha.
