The sitting MlAs of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), who have not been given ticket for assembly election this time, have intensified lobbying in the state. The party has so far declared 67 candidates out of the total 90 assembly seats. Much pressure is being mounted in the remaining 23 seats, for which the party has not yet decided its candidates.
In some seats, the party is waiting for the declaration of Congress party candidates. In the first list, BJP had cut the ticket of 10 sitting MlAs and in the second list also, the party may cut the tickets of 4-5 MlAs.
On getting green signal from the Central election committee, the BJP on Sunday night released its first list of 67 candidates. In 23 constituencies, name of candidates has been stopped. Now, the remaining names would be declared after getting the nod from the party’s national president Rajnath Singh. The party is facing heavy opposition from the sitting MlAs, in the constituencies, where it has not yet declared the names of candidates.
Candidates for Premnagar and Bhattgaon seats in Surguja division have not been declared. Both these seats is represented by BJP women MlAs Renuka Singh and Rajni Tripathi.
However, there is heavy opposition against fielding them again. The Premnagar seat has been made general after delimitation in 2008, hence there are more ticket claimants. Former chairman of Textbooks Corporation Bhimsen Agrawal and ex-chairman of Markfed Radhakrishna Gupta also stake their claim for the seat. Renuka Singh won the seat consecutively for two terms and she is the strongest claimant for the seat.
Besides the sitting MlA Rajni Tripathi, two more strong claimants for Bhattgaon seat. Rajni had won the by-election with a huge margin, so she seeks ticket from the seat. Because of the pulls and pressure, declaration of both these seats has been stopped. Candidate for Sitapur has not been declared. last time former minister Ganesh Ram Bhagat was the candidate from this seat. However, this time he seeks ticket from Jashpur, instead of Sitapur.
Candidates for two main seats in Raigarh district – Raigarh and Kharsiya – have not yet been declared. Besides former MlA Vijay Agrawal, Roshan Agrawal and Dr Preetam Mishra are also strong claimants for this seat. Similarly, the party did not decided candidate against Umesh Patel son of slain Congress leader Nandkumar Patel, where there are three strong ticket claimants of the party, including Kamal Garg.
The party has not declared candidates for Pali Tanakhar and against former chief minister Ajit Jogi at Marvahi.
The party faces huge protest against fielding sitting MlA and deputy speaker of the Assembly Narayan Chandel from Janjgir-Champa. In view of the protest, declaration of his name has been stopped. Candidates for Mahasamund and Khallari seats have not yet been decided. There are three strong claimants each for both these seats. Revolt like situation is there. Vimal Chopra, Moti Sahu and Punam Chandrakar are mounting pressure for ticket from Mahasamund.
In Bhattapara, there were huge protest against giving ticket to Shivratan Sharma, who lost the seat during the last two elections. In view of the huge protest, the responsibility for selecting candidate for this seat has been given to the party president Rajnath Singh. The situation in Dondilohara in Balod district, Durg Rural and Vaishali Nagar is almost the same.
For Bemetra seat there is pull and pressure from half a dozen candidates. Former candidate Awadhesh Chandel, district BJP president Rajendra Sharma, Harshvardhan Tiwari son of ex-MlA Mahesh Tiwari and Verma are mounting pressure for ticket from Bemetra.
Declaration of candidates for both the seats of Kawardha district – Kawardha and Pandariya – has not yet been done. Ticket to present MlA Dr Siyaram Sahu from Kawardha has been opposed. Half-a-dozen names, including that of Abhishek Singh son of chief minister Dr Raman Singh going round for the seat. Similarly, former candidate lalji Chandrawanshi, ex-district panchayat president Raghuraj Singh and Yuva Ayog chairman Santosh Pandey are the strong claimants of Pandariya seat.