Gwalior:

Union Minister Narendra Singh Tomar said on Sunday that there are some differences among the BJP workers over ticket distribution, but everything is under the party’s control. The angry protest by BJP workers started after the party on Saturday released its fifth list of 92 candidates for Madhya Pradesh assembly polls.

Narendra Singh Tomar told ANI, “The list of all BJP candidates except two seats has been released. All are good candidates. All the party workers have started their work. There are some differences because there are many people asking for tickets. The BJP has the entire situation under control. We will form the government.”

He further said that the Congress can claim its victory, but we are seeking votes on the basis of what we have done.

The BJP on Saturday evening released its fifth list of 92 candidates for the assembly polls, and now the party has declared candidates for 228 out of 230 seats. It is yet to declare candidates for the Guna (scheduled caste) and Vidisha seats.

Union Ministers Narendra Singh Tomar and Prahlad Singh Patel have been fielded from the Dimani and Narsinghpur constituencies respectively. Union Minister Faggan Singh Kulaste will contest from the Niwas seat.

Madhya Pradesh is one of the five states set to hold elections this year. The state is scheduled to vote on November 17, with the vote count taking place on December 3.

Voters will choose legislators from 230 Assembly constituencies.

In the last 2018 assembly elections, Congress won 114 seats with a vote share of 40.89 per cent while the BJP came second and managed to win 109 seats. Its vote share was 41.02 per cent. The Congress came to power with Kamal Nath taking oath as the chief minister but Jyotiraditya Scindia, along with 22 loyalist MLAs, switched over to BJP in 2020.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

New Delhi:

The BJP has fielded 18 MPs, including four Union ministers, for the latest round of assembly polls so far — seven each in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan and four in Chhattisgarh. Seventeen of them, including three Union ministers fielded in Madhya Pradesh, are Lok Sabha members and most of them have been fielded on relatively difficult assembly seats, where the party had lost in the last elections.

The party on Monday announced fresh lists of candidates for Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh.

Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan will contest from his traditional Budhni seat as the BJP announced the names of 57 more candidates for the assembly polls to be held on November 17. With this, the BJP has so far announced its candidates for 136 seats in the 230-member Madhya Pradesh assembly.

The names of former Chhattisgarh chief minister Raman Singh and state BJP president Arun Sao figured in its latest list of candidates for the state, taking to 85 the number of seats in the 90-member assembly for which it has named candidates.

Three MPs, including Union Minister Renuka Singh, also featured in the second list of 64 candidates for Chhattisgarh.

The BJP has sent out a message about its determined efforts to put its best foot forward by fielding so many regional heavyweights, including Union ministers Narendra Singh Tomar, Faggan Singh Kulaste, and Prahlad Singh Patel in Madhya Pradesh, a state where it is in power and is facing a keen challenge from the Congress.

Party sources said fielding seasoned leaders in the assembly polls also helps defuse factional feuds as they enjoy more acceptance. Such a move also raises the stakes for the satraps seeking key roles in government and organisation by throwing them the challenge of ensuring a good performance for the party in their seats and adjoining constituencies, they said.

Rajsamand MP Diya Kumari and Jaipur Rural MP Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore are among the BJP candidates from Rajasthan.

Ms Kumari will fight the elections from Jaipur’s Vidhyadhar Nagar constituency, Mr Rathore, a former Union minister and retired Army officer, has been fielded from Jhotwara, also in Jaipur district.

Vidhyadhar Nagar seat is currently held by BJP MLA Narpat Singh Rajvi, a five-time MLA and son-in-law of former vice president Bhairon Singh Shekhawat.

The remaining 40 constituencies for which the BJP announced its candidates are held by the ruling Congress and other parties.

Jhunjhunu MP Narendra Kumar will contest the elections from Mandawa, Alwar MP Baba Balaknath from Tijara, Ajmer MP Bhagirath Choudhary from Kishangarh, Jalore MP Devji Patel from Sanchore, and Meena will fight from the Sawai Madhopur constituency.

Announcing the election schedule at a press conference here, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Rajiv Kumar said single-phase assembly polls will be held in Madhya Pradesh on November 17, Rajasthan on November 23, Telangana on November 30 and Mizoram on November 7 while Chhattisgarh will go to the polls in two phases on November 7 (20 seats) and 17 (70 seats).

The BJP and the Congress will be engaged in a direct fight in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, and Rajasthan while the two parties are also in contention for power in Telangana, where Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao-led Bharat Rashtra Samithi is eyeing a third straight term.

The BJP is in power in Madhya Pradesh while the Congress is in power in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh. 

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

New Delhi:

The BJP on Monday took a swipe at Rahul Gandhi over a slip of the tongue that his party’s governments in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh were on their way out, and said he had accepted defeat. Soon after the announcement of the election schedule in five states, Mr Gandhi while replying to a question on the party’s prospects said the governments in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Telangana, and Chhattisgarh were going.

“In Madhya Pradesh, their state government is going, the government is also going in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh and also in Telangana. Sorry, I spoke wrongly. You confused me,” Mr Gandhi said and soon corrected himself.

“In Chhattisgarh, we have our government and it is coming back as also in Rajasthan. but BJP’s government in Madhya Pradesh is going. In Telangana too their (BRS) government is going and ours is coming. Seriously speaking, the atmosphere is very positive,” he said.

Posting a video clip of Mr Gandhi’s remarks on its “X” handle, the BJP wrote, “Rahul Gandhi has accepted that the Congress governments in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh are on their way out.” Several BJP leaders also shared the video clip on their X handles.

राहुल गांधी ने स्वीकार कर लिया, राजस्थान और छत्तीसगढ़ से जा रही है कांग्रेस सरकार! pic.twitter.com/85ORupRavs

— BJP (@BJP4India) October 9, 2023

Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Telangana, and Mizoram will go to the assembly polls between November 7 and 30.

The Election Commission on Monday announced that single-phase assembly polls will be held in Madhya Pradesh on November 17, Rajasthan on November 23, Telangana on November 30, and Mizoram on November 7 while Chhattisgarh will go to the polls in two phases on November 7 (20 seats) and 17 (70 seats).

New Delhi:

The Aam Aadmi Party is ready to contest the upcoming assembly polls in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, and Rajasthan with full strength and the names of candidates will be declared soon, its national convener and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said Monday.

The Election Commission has announced that assembly polls in Mizoram, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Telangana will be held on different days beginning November 7 and the votes will be counted on December 3.

Asked about the AAP’s preparation for the polls, Mr Kejriwal said, “We are prepared to contest the elections in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and Chhattisgarh with full strength.”

When asked whether his party will contest the elections as part of the INDIA bloc, he said that “whatever happens will be apprised”.

Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan are currently ruled by the Congress, which like the AAP is a partner in the opposition INDIA bloc.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Bhopal:

The BJP might be looking to tighten the screws on Shivraj Singh Chouhan, the party’s longest-serving chief minister, by not announcing his constituency in even the second list of candidates for the upcoming Madhya Pradesh assembly elections released on Monday. The incumbent party has, instead, pulled out its top guns to manage aspirations of senior regional leaders, extract the most from its top leadership to strengthen seats where they are weak, and throw the chief ministerial race wide open, a look at 76 of the total 230 candidates it has released so far shows. So far, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is at the centre of the BJP’s electoral campaign in the state.

In a surprise move that has set political circles abuzz, the party announced it is fielding seven Lok Sabha members, three of them union ministers, and also its national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya, hours after PM Modi’s visit to Bhopal. Four of them have been MLAs in the past.

Three Union Ministers – Narendra Singh Tomar, Prahlad Singh Patel, and Faggan Singh Kulaste – are also in the running. 

Mr Vijayvargiya is contesting state polls a decade after he won the Mhow seat of his native Indore district for the second time in 2013. He will contest from Indore-1 seat. Mr Tomar will contest the Vidhan Sabha elections after two decades. He last won the assembly polls from Gwalior for the second time in a row in 2003.

The ruling party also seems to be trying to strike a balance between its various senior regional leaders on the election battlefield, to extract the most out of their experience and influence along specific regions and castes.

By fielding seven sitting MPs, not only does the party want to win the weak seats, but also ensure that neighbouring seats too are influenced by these seasoned politicians’ continued presence.

Madhya Pradesh Congress chief and former chief minister Kamal Nath said the BJP “has accepted defeat”. 

“The list of BJP candidates denying the claims of 18.5 years of BJP government and more than 15 years of Shivraji development is a sure seal of internal defeat of BJP which claims to be a party of crores of workers,” he posted on X in Hindi.

एमपी में हार स्वीकार कर चुकी भाजपा ने उम्मीद का आखरी झूठा दांव आज खेला है।

18.5 साल की भाजपाई सरकार और 15 साल से ज्यादा के शिवराज़ी विकास के दावों को नक्कारने वाली भाजपाई प्रत्याशियों की सूची करोड़ों कार्यकर्ताओं की पार्टी का दावा करने वाली भाजपा की आंतरिक हार पर पक्की मोहर है।…

— Kamal Nath (@OfficeOfKNath) September 25, 2023

Senior Congress leader Randeep Singh Surjewala went a step further, claiming it’s a fear of the Congress that the BJP has roped in top central leaders to rescue a “sinking ship” in the state. He alleged that Mr Chouhan knows he’s going to lose, but wants to take down these big leaders, who are political competitors, along with him.

मध्यप्रदेश में BJP की दूसरी लिस्ट का सच

*हम तो डूबेंगे, तुम्हें भी ले डूबेंगे सनम*

18 सालों में मध्यप्रदेश को भाजपा की सरकार ने बर्बादी की कगार पर पहुँचा दिया। ये बात प्रदेश की जनता के साथ साथ भाजपा का केंद्रीय नेतृत्व भी जान रहा है। इसीलिए 15 दिन पहले श्रीमान अमित शाह और कल…

— Randeep Singh Surjewala (@rssurjewala) September 26, 2023

The four other Lok Sabha MPs in the race are — four-time MP from Satna seat Ganesh Singh, who has been fielded from his current seat, second-time sitting MP Riti Pathak from Sidhi Lok Sabha seat, who has been given the ticket for Sishi assembly seat, four-time Jabalpur MP Rakesh Singh, who will contest from Jabalpur-West, and third time MP from Hoshangabad seat Uday Pratap Singh, who will be in the fray from Gadarwara seat of Narsinghpur district.