NEW DELHI: The
Congress
on Saturday released the
fourth list
of 46
candidates
for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.
Congress leader
Digvijay Singh
to contest from Madhya Pradesh’s Rajgarh Lok Sabha constituency, UP Congress president
Ajay Rai
from Varanasi, Imran Masood from Saharanpur. Former Uttarakhand chief minister Harish Rawat’s son Virender Rawat has been fielded from Haridwar.
Congress leader PL Punia’s son, Tanuj Punia, has been given a Lok Sabha ticket from Bara Banki in Uttar Pradesh.
The 2024 Lok Sabha elections, which will begin from April 19, will be the third time that Rai faces off against PM Modi from Varanasi.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, PM Modi had defeated his nearest rival Shalini Yadav of Samajwadi Party by 4.80 lakh votes. Rai had bagged 1,52,548 votes and secured the third spot. He had got a vote share of 14.38% against PM Modi’s vote share of a staggering 63.62%.
In Jammu and Kashmir, Congress has fielded two-time MP Chaudhary Lal Singh from the Udhampur Lok Sabha seat. He is pitted against Union Minister Jitendra Singh. The party has also given a ticket to the working President of J&K Congress and former state minister Raman Bhalla from the Jammu seat.
The list contains candidates from seats in Assam, Andaman, Chhattisgarh, MP, Maharashtra, Manipur, Mizoram, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, UP, Uttrakhand and West Bengal.
Karti Chidambaram has been fielded from Tamil Nadu’s Sivaganga, Manickam Tagore from Virudhnagar, S Jothimani from Karur.
Danish Ali, who joined the party just a few days ago, will contest from UP’s Amroha; Imran Masood from Saharanpur and Alok Mishra from Kanpur.
The Congress has left Rajasthan’s Nagaur Lok Sabha constituency for Hanuman Beniwal’s Rashtriya Loktantrik Party.
The sitting MP from Tamil Nady, Manickam Tagore, will be contesting again from Viruddhnagar.
(This is a developing story)