BHOPAL: State BJP on Wednesday afternoon announced the names of mayor candidates for the urban civic polls in Indore and Ratlam. In the evening, the party finally declared its last mayoral candidate -- Suman Sharma from Gwalior. State Congress which declared the names of 15 of the total 16 mayor candidates last Thursday, is yet to declare its final candidate from Ratlam.
After much discussion through the days, arguments and Tuesday night drama over Indore mayor candidature, the BJP declared 40-year-old M-Phil in law Pushyamitra Bhargava as its candidate against the Congress’ Sanjay Shukla. Indore will see an electoral tussle between two Brahmin candidates in the urban civic elections.
While Sanjay Shukla is a Congress MLA and a known face in the city, BJP’s Bhargava has never contested an election before. However, he has been active in student politics and for two years worked for the BJP in Assam. Indore Municipal Corporation is not just the most important urban civic in the state but also in the country since it has won the Swachh Bharat Cleanest City Award for five years in a row under former mayor Malini Gaur.
There were many aspirants for the BJP Indore mayor ticket, including Ramesh Mandola, who is close to BJP national secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya. Mandola is three times MLA from Indore – II seat and won assembly elections with massive victory margins. Till late evening on Tuesday, Ramesh Mandola was in the BJP state headquarters here asking for the mayor ticket from Indore. However, seeing the party not in tune with him, he left for Indore alone at night.
Others former MLAs -Jitu Jirati and Gopi Chand Nema left after speaking to the core group members including CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan and state BJP president VD Sharma. However, half-way to Indore, they again returned to the Bhopal BJP office. Mayoral candidate for Ratlam is Prahlad Patel, a 46-year-old party worker who is into hospitality business. And no, he is not the Union minister Prahlad Patel who also hails from the state. BJP mayor candidate Prahlad Patel is also a district general secretary of BJP OBC Morcha.
It looks as though even after his best efforts, Union minister for civil aviation Jyotiraditya Scindia could not get Gwalior’s mayor ticket for his “mami (maternal aunt)” and former minister Maya Singh. Gwalior mayor candidate Suman Sharma’s father-in-law Dharamveer Sharma was mayor of Gwalior in 1984; he was also MLA in 1985 and 1993. Suman’s father was an MLA from Navalgarh in Rajasthan.
She has an MA degree in history and worked for the party in various capacities for long including in the Mahila Morcha as in-charge of assembly seats during successive elections in MP.
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