BJP announces names for 15 Gujarat Lok Sabha seats; 5 MPs dropped, 2 Union ministers Mandaviya, Rupala fielded

PTI

Ahmedabad, March 2

The Bharatiya Janata Party on Saturday announced names of candidates for 15 out of 26 Lok Sabha seats in Gujarat, dropping five sitting MPs and giving ticket to Union ministers Mansukh Mandaviya and Parshottam Rupala.

The BJP announced its first list of candidates for the Lok Sabha polls, to be held in the first half of the year, in the evening in New Delhi.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah will fight from Gandhinagar, a seat he won with a huge margin in the 2019 polls, while Gujarat BJP chief CR Paatil has been retained from Navsari.

Sitting MPs who have been denied ticket are former Union minister of state Mohan Kundariya from Rajkot, Ramesh Dhaduk from Porbandar, Kirit Solanki from Ahmedabad East, Parbat Patel from Banaskantha and Ratansinh Rathod from Panchmahal.

Union agriculture minister Parshottam Rupala, who hails from neighbouring Amreli district, will fight from Rajkot in place of Kundariya.

Mandaviya, who is from Bhavnagar district, has been fielded from Porbandar in place of Dhaduk.

The BJP has fielded six-time MP and senior tribal leader Mansukh Vasava from Bharuch, which is one of the two seats given by the opposition Congress to the Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party as part of their INDIA bloc agreement.

AAP has already announced the name of its Dediapada MLA Chaitar Vasava from the Bharuch seat.

Union minister of state for communications Devusinh Chauhan has been fielded from Kheda, which he won in 2014 and 2019.

The two women in the first list of 15 candidates from the state are Jamnagar MP Poonam Madam and Rekhaben Chaudhary, who has been given a ticket for the first time from Banaskantha in place of Parbat Patel.

The BJP has given ticket to Dinesh Makwana in Ahmedabad West (Scheduled Caste) seat in place of Kirit Solanki, while in Panchmahal, sitting MP Ratansinh Rathod has been replaced by Rajpalsinh Jadav.

The ruling party has retained Vinod Chavda from Kutch (SC) seat, Bharatsinh Dabhi from Patan, Mitesh Patel from Anand and Jaswantsinh Bhabhor from Dahod.

In the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP had won all 26 seats from the state.

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