The saffron party released the first list of candidates who will contest the Punjab assembly polls from the district on Friday.
The list features two former bureaucrats, an advocate, a turncoat leader and a businessman. Former IAS officer SR Laddhar, who had merged his political outfit, the Kirti Kisan Sher-e-Punjab Party,with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in December, will contest from Gill constituency, which is at present represented by another former bureaucrat – Congress’ Kuldip Singh Vaid.
Former tehsildar Kanwar Narinder Singh, will slug it out in Jagraon against sitting AAP MLA Sarvjit Kaur Manuke and former SAD MLA and ex- bureaucrat SR Kaler.
AAP turncoat Gurpreet Singh Bhatti, who had formed the People’s Party of Punjab (PPP) with state finance minister Manpreet Singh Badal (Congress), will be contesting on a BJP ticket from the Khanna assembly constituency. Bhatti had defected from the AAP in November in favour of the BJP.
The party has fielded advocate Bikram Singh Sidhu from the Ludhiana West constituency, which is being represented by Congress heavyweight Bharat Bhushan Ashu. Political pundits had already predicted that Sidhu was the probable BJP candidate from the West constituency as he had been vigorously canvassing in the area and had been posturing himself as the BJP candidate for around a year.
From Ludhiana Central, Gurdev Sharma Debi has clinched the party ticket for the second time, edging out the BJP’s state vice-president, Parvin Bansal, who had also been eying the ticket. Debi, who is the state treasurer of the saffron party, had lost the 2017 election to Congress leader Surinder Dawar.
{{/usCountry}}From Ludhiana Central, Gurdev Sharma Debi has clinched the party ticket for the second time, edging out the BJP’s state vice-president, Parvin Bansal, who had also been eying the ticket. Debi, who is the state treasurer of the saffron party, had lost the 2017 election to Congress leader Surinder Dawar.
{{/usCountry}}Those in the know say Bansal wants to fight the poll from Ludhiana North, but party spokesperson Anil Sareen is also vying for a ticket from the constituency.