Rajasthan polls: BJP’s second list likely soon, around 80 names approved in CEC meeting

Jaipur : The BJP is expected to announce its second list of candidates for the upcoming Rajasthan Assembly election within a couple of days, party sources said on Saturday.

At a late night meeting on Friday, the Central Election Committee (CEC) meeting, under the chairmanship of the party’s national president J.P. approved names of 70-80 candidates which included a few MPs.

“The list may be released today or tomorrow, basically, after Congress’ first list which is expected to be released today,” the said sources.

Apart from Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, others who attended the high-level meeting include B.S Yediyurappa, K. Laxman, Iqbal Singh Lalpura, Sudha Yadav, Devendra Fadnavis, Om Mathur, Nitin Patel, D.K. Aruna, Satyanarayan Jatiya and Sarbananda Sonowal .

Besides, former chief minister Vasundhara Raje, Union Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal, State president C.P. Joshi, Leader of Opposition in the Assembly Rajendra Rathore and leaders associated with Rajasthan were also in attendance.

There is a likelihood of new faces making it to the list, the sources added.

Around two-three MPs are expected to be fielded in the polls.

Of the total, about 45 MLAs can get tickets for the assembly elections again.

In the last three days, the party’s core group met twice to reach a consensus on the second list.

On October 17, a meeting of the state BJP core group was held at the residence of national president Nadda which was also attended by Amit Shah.

Another core group meeting was held at the residence of Union Minister and state election in-charge Prahlad Joshi on Thursday. It was attended by CP Joshi, Vasundhara Raje, Rajendra Rathore, Deputy Leader of Opposition Satish Poonia, state in-charge Arun Singh besides leaders included in the core group.