Ending speculation on Monday, the Bharatiya Janata Party released its first list of candidates for 64 of the 70 Vidhan Sabha constituencies in the State including most of the turncoats who had left the Congress and joined the BJP.
According to the party office bearers, the Central Election Committee of the BJP met yesterday (Sunday) with its national president Amit Shah presiding over in the presence of prime minister Narendra Modi, minister of Home Affairs Rajnath Singh and Minister of Finance Arun Jaitley among other members of the Central Election Committee of the BJP attending the meet. The names of the candidates to be fielded by the party in the Assembly constituencies of Uttarakhand were decided upon in the meeting of the party’s CEC. According to the list of candidates issued by the party on Monday, nine former Congress leaders now in the BJP had been fielded from more than half a dozen constituencies. Harak Singh Rawat has been fielded from Kotdwar Vidhan Sabha constituency while other former Congress members now in the BJP who have been named in the first list of BJP candidates include ex sitting MlAs Shaila Rani Rawat from Kedarnath, Subodh Uniyal from Narendranagar constituency, Umesh Sharma ‘Kau’ from Raipur constituency, Shailendra Mohan Singhal from Jaspur, Pranav Singh ‘Champion’ from Khanpur constituency and Yashpal Arya from Bajpur constituency in addition to Satpal Maharaj from Chaubattakhal constituency, Yashpal Arya’s son Sanjeev Arya from Nainital (SC) constituency and ex MlA and former CM Vijay Bahuguna’s son Saurabh Bahuguna from the Sitarganj constituency previously represented by his father. The other candidates announced by the BJP on Monday include sitting MlAs Malchand from Purola (SC) constituency, Harbans Kapoor from Dehradun Cantt constituency, Ganesh Joshi from Mussoorie constituency, Pradeep Batra from Roorkee, Sahadev Pundir from Sahaspur, Premchandra Aggarwal from Rishikesh, Madan Kaushik from Haridwar, Adesh Chauhan from BHEl –Ranipur constituency, Sanjay Gupta from laksar, Swami Yateeshwaranand from Haridwar Rural, Dilip Singh Rawat from lansdowne, Bishan Singh Chufal from Didihat, Chandan Ram Dass from Bageshwar, Surendra Singh Jeena from
Sult constituency, Ajay Bhatt from Ranikhet, Rekha Arya from Someshwar (SC), Puran Fartiyal from lohaghat constituency, Bansidhar Bhagat from Kaladhungi constituency, Harbhajan Singh Cheema from Kashipur constituency, Arvind Pandey from Gadarpur constituency, Rajesh Shukla from Kichha constituency, Rajkumar Thukral from Rudrapur constituency, Prem Singh Rana from Nanakmatta (ST) constituency and Pushkar Singh Dhami from the Khatima constituency. The candidates other than sitting MlAs announced in the first list include ex-MlAs Kedar Singh Rawat from Yamunotri constituency, Gopal Singh Rawat from Gangotri, Mahendra Bhatt from Badrinath, Vijay Singh Panwar from Pratapnagar constituency, Khajandas from Rajpur Road constituency, Trivendra Singh Rawat from Doiwala constituency, Prakash Pant from Pithoragarh constituency, Balwant Singh Bhoriyal from Kapkote constituency and Raghunath Singh Chauhan from Almora constituency. In addition to the ex-MlA candidates, the other candidates announced by the BJP include Maganlal Shah from Tharali (SC), Surendra Singh Negi from Karnprayag, Bharat Chaudhary from Rudraprayag, Shakti lal Shah from Ghansali (SC) constituency, Vinod Kandari from Devprayag constituency,Dhan Singh Negi from Tehri constituency, Narayan Singh Rana (ex-MlC) from Dhanaulti constituency, Suresh Rathore from Jwalapur (SC) constituency, Subodh Rakesh, the brother of late cabinet minister Surendra Rakesh from Bhagwanpur, Deshraj Karnwal from Jhabreda (SC), Jaibhagwan Saini from Pirankaliyar constituency, Rishipal Baliyan from Manglaur constituency, Ritu Khandoori Bhushan from Yamkeshwar constituency, Mukesh Koli from Pauri (SC) constituency, Dhan Singh Rawat from Srinagar constituency, Virendra Pal Singh from Dharchula, Meena Gangola from Gangolihat (SC) constituency, Mahesh Negi from Dwarahat constituency, Subhash Pandey from Jageshwar constituency, Kailash Gehtori from Champawat constituency and Naveen Dumka from the lalkuan constituency.