BJP releases 148 names for Bengal elections, Mukul Roy to contest

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Thursday released its second list of candidates for the upcoming Bengal elections, naming 148 candidates for the fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth phases.

BJP vice president Mukul Roy will contest from the Krishnanagar Uttar assembly constituency. He will be facing off against TMC candidate Kaushani Mukherjee. Roy’s son will contest from Bijpur.

As per the list, the BJP is fielding a fifth MP, Jagannath Sarkar, who will contest from Shantipur. 

Former Chief Economic Advisor Ashok Lahiri is also expected to be among the candidates and might be fielded from Balurgat. He had been named as the candidate from Alipurduar in the first list, but was later replaced with a local candidate.

Veteran Bengal unit leader Rahul Sinha will contest from Habra.

The name of Dilip Ghosh, the party’s state unit chief, is not on the list. Sources said he would not contest the assembly elections.

The party has also continued with fielding celebrities in this round, naming folk artiste Ashim Sarkar from the Haringhata assembly seat, popular actor Sravanti Chatterjee from Kolkata’s Behala East, footballer Kalyan Choubey from Kolkata’s Maniktala, and actor Rudranil Ghosh—said to be close to Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee once—from her safe seat, Bhowanipore.

Scientist Gobhardhan Das will be fielded from Purbasthali Uttar.

Additionally, the party has fielded Bidhan Parui from the Falta assembly seat, Paapia Adhikari from Uluberia Dakshin, Anupam Ghosh from Jagatballavpur and Chandan Mandal from the Baruipur Purba assembly seat.

There are also at least six Muslim candidates in the latest list.

On Wednesday, the BJP had announced the names of four more candidates for the polls.

After the announcement of the BJP candidates, protests broke out in the state against the fielding of a large number of former Trinamool Congress leaders as BJP candidates. Sources said that the seats in question had strong local contenders, whose supporters rebelled at the entry of outsiders. The BJP called it a “temporary situation”.

The party’s first list of candidates, issued last week, had also triggered huge protests which continued for two days and had to be quelled by the police with a lathi charge. Angry supporters had gathered at the party’s election office in Kolkata and heckled senior leaders Mukul Roy, Arjun Singh and Shiv Prakash.

They had been joined by protestors from Udaynarayanpur in Howrah. In the evening, people had swarmed in from Raidighi in South 24 Parganas. Agitated BJP workers had ransacked the party office at Singur and the BJP’s district headquarters office at Chinsurah, both in Hooghly district.

Overall, the BJP has announced 157 names for the state’s 294 seats. Five seats are yet to be declared, namely, Balurghat, Rashbehari, Darjeeling, Kurseong and Kalimpong.

Elections to the 294-member state assembly will be held in eight phases, starting from 27 March with the final round of voting taking place on 29 April. The counting of votes will take place on 2 May.