In New List, Congress Fields Manish Tewari from Anandpur Sahib, Jyotiraditya Scindia Gets Guna Again

Bhopal: The Congress on Friday fielded former union ministers Jyotiraditya Scindia and Manish Tewari from Guna (Madhya Pradesh) and Anandpur Sahib (Punjab) parliamentary constituencies respectively.

With this, the party has announced a total of 386 candidates for the Lok Sabha elections. The BJP is yet to announce eight candidates out of total 29 seats.

Despite Congress announcement, both the political rivals are yet to name anyone from prestigious Indore seats. Entangled in age factor, Indore MP Sumitra Mahajan had celebrated her 77th birthday on Friday.

It was widely speculated that Scindia could be asked by the party to contest from any other seat than Guna. Sources had claimed that the party wanted him to contest from Indore or Gwalior.

However, Scindia seems to have stood his ground and remained adamant on re-nomination from Guna, his family bastion, also represented by her grand-mother Vijaya Raje Scindia and father Madhav Rao in the past.

Three-time party nominee Ashok Singh is in the hunt from Gwalior while the party seems to be adamant on fielding Scindia’s wife Priyadarshini from Gwalior. The party also held back Dhar and Indore seats. Tribal outfit JAYS is also adamant on fielding one of its candidate on Congress ticket from Dhar, the region where the outfit is primarily based.

Manish Tewari had backed out from contesting from his Ludhiana Lok Sabha seat in 2014 citing health reasons. He was initially seeking the party ticket from Chandigarh, where the party has fielded former railway minister Pawan Kumar Bansal.

The Congress also fielded former Barnala MLA Kewal Singh Dhillon from Sangrur Lok Sabha seat. He is pitted against sitting AAP MP Bhagwant Mann and former state finance minister Parminder Singh Dhindsa who is contesting on the Shiromani Akali Dal ticket.

The party announced that Shailendra Patel would contest the Vidisha Lok Sabha constituency and Mona Sustani from Rajgarh, both in Madhya Pradesh.

The Congress also fielded Rigzin Spalbar from Ladakh in Jammu and Kashmir and Shashwat Kedar from Valmiki Nagar constituency in Bihar.