BJP Drops 3 Sitting MPs In Bihar, Renominates Giriraj Singh, Ravi Shankar Prasad

BJP also dropped its incumbent MPs Chedi Pawasan and Ajay Kumar Nishad from Sasaram and Muzaffarpur constituencies respectively.

The BJP on Sunday announced its fifth list of candidates for 111 seats for the upcoming Lok Sabha Elections, including 17 seats in Bihar, dropping three sitting MPs, including Union Minister Ashwani Kumar Choubey.

According to the list released by the party in New Delhi, Choubey, who was elected from Buxar for the second consecutive term in 2019, was replaced by Mithilesh Tiwari, a senior BJP leader and a former MLA.

The saffron party renominated Union minister Giriraj Singh from Begusarai and former Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad from Patna Sahib. Union ministers RK Singh and Nityanand Rai have also been fielded from their current seats, while in Uttar Pradesh the ruling party named 13 more candidates.

The party also dropped its incumbent MPs Chedi Pawasan and Ajay Kumar Nishad from Sasaram and Muzaffarpur constituencies respectively. 

BJP also fielded former MLA Shivesh Ram for Sasaram, while Raj Bhushan Nishad, a greenhorn in the Lok Sabha polls, will contest the Muzaffarpur seat on a party ticket.

Rajya Sabha MP Vivek Thakur was fielded from Nawada, where the BJP would be contesting this time, instead of its ally Lok Janshakti Party (LJP).

All the remaining 14 candidates are sitting MPs, who will seek re-election from their respective seats. 

The announcement comes as BJP named 111 more Lok Sabha poll candidates, dropping Union ministers Ashwini Kumar Choubey and V K Singh, and MP Varun Gandhi, while fielding actors Kangana Ranaut and Arun Govil.

Union minister Dharmendra Pradhan will contest from Sambalpur and the party's spokesperson Sambit Patra will try his luck again from Puri after losing out in a close contest in 2019.

The party has axed former Union minister Anantkumar Hegde, a six-term Lok Sabha member from Uttara Kannada, this time. The party has named 19 more candidates from West Bengal, including former Calcutta High Court judge Abhijit Gangopadhyay from Tamluk.

It has shifted Dilip Ghosh, the MP from Medinipur, to Bardhaman–Durgapur, dropping the incumbent S S Ahluwalia.It named seven candidates from Rajasthan, four each from Haryana, Karnataka and Kerala, 18 from Odisha, and three each from from Maharashtra and Jharkhand among other states.