Nitin Gadkari from Nagpur; Piyush Goyal to make Lok Sabha election debut; 32 MPs dropped

Union ministers Nitin Gadkari, Piyush Goyal and Anurag Singh Thakur and former Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal figured in BJP's second list of 72 Lok Sabha candidates announced on Wednesday. The ruling party has dropped Union minister Darshana Jardosh and former ministers Sadananda Gowda and Ramesh Pokhriyal 'Nishank' from their seats. The party has dropped 32 MPs.

Gadkari will seek re-election from Nagpur in Maharashtra and Thakur from Hamirpur in Himachal Pradesh. While Goyal will make his election debut from Mumbai North, Lal will do so from Karnal.

Two other former chief ministers, Trivendra Singh Rawat and Basavaraj Bommai, have been fielded from Haridwar in Uttarakhand and Haveri in Karnataka, respectively. Bommai will also make his debut in the Lok Sabha polls.


Union minister and Udupi Chikmagalur MP Shobha Karandlaje has been fielded from Bangalore North.

In the second list, the party announced 20 candidates each from Karnataka and Maharashtra, seven from Gujarat, six each from Haryana and Telangana, five from Madhya Pradesh, two each from Delhi, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand and one each from Tripura and Dadar and Nagar Haveli.

In Gujarat, Surat MP Jardosh has been dropped. Four other MPs too have been dropped. Out of 20 candidates for Karnataka, nine MPs have been dropped, including former state unit chief Nalin Kateel and two-term Mysore MP Prathap Simha, who was recently caught in a row over the issue of Parliament security breach.

In Maharashtra, the party has dropped seven MPs, including Gopal Shetty from Mumbai North and Manoj Kotak from Mumbai North East. In Delhi, the party has dropped cricketer Gautam Gambhir from East Delhi and has fielded Harsh Malhotra. Gambhir had earlier requested the party not to consider him for the election. Northwest Delhi MP Hansraj Hans has been replaced with Yogendra Chandolia. Barring Manoj Tiwari, all six MPs from Delhi have been dropped.

In Uttarakhand, BJP communication in-charge Anil Baluni has been fielded from Garhwal.