925 candidates in field

 Tribune News Service

Nine hundred and twentyfive candidates have been left in the field for the Punjab Assembly elections slated for early next month following rejection of papers of 279 candidates after scrutiny.

Giving this information here today, Mrs Usha Sharma, Joint Chief Electoral Officer, said that the number of nomination papers rejected was slightly on the high side., but ascribed it to new stipulations in the poll law under which an independent candidate had to file 10 sets of nominations while official party candidates papers had to be accompanied by a written authorisation by the party president.

PTI adds: Prominent among those whose papers were rejected is the former Youth Congress chief, Mr Maninderjit Singh Bitta who was renominated for the Amritsar (South) seat as the Congress candidate. His papers were rejected as these were seconded by a "bogus" voter. Now Mr Harjinder Singh a covering candidate is contesting from this seat in place of Mr Bitta.

Out of eight candidates in the Ropar Parliamentary seat, four are in fray, including Mr Buta Singh of the Congress and Mrs Satvinder Kaur of the Akali Dal (B).

With the rejection of nomination papers of their candidates or non-filing of papers, the Shiromani Akali Dal ( B) is now contesting on 92 seats. The Congress is fielding its candidates in 106 constituencies against 107 and the BJP is contesting 22 seats as against 23 announced earlier. In the Ludhiana ( North) constituency, the nomination papers of both the BJP candidates, Mr Sunil Mehra and Mr Vir Abhimanyu, were rejected as both of them had authorisation letters, but one of them did not withdraw the papers. Mr Nahar Singh Gill, Congress candidate from Ludhiana (rural) was not able to file his nomination papers since he didn't have the party authorisation letter.