NEW DELHI: Amid the buzz that Congress and
AAP
may seal their seat sharing pact and announce candidates soon, BJP called a meeting on Wednesday evening of its senior Delhi leaders to finalise the list of candidates.
Sources said that the central leadership and Delhi leaders discussed names of the seven probables on a list of 25, which was sent by the state BJP unit to the top leaders a few days ago. With April 23 being the last date for filing nominations, the names of the BJP candidates can be announced by Friday, said a source.
The meeting was attended by Delhi unit chief
Manoj Tiwari, national general secretary organisation Ram Lal, party’s Delhi in-charge for
Lok Sabha elections
,
Nirmala Sitharaman, co in-charge Jaibhan Singh Pawaiyya, and vice-president in charge for Delhi Shyam Jaju among others. Senior party functionaries said Tiwari was campaigning in West Bengal and addressing election rallies when he was asked to cut short his tour and return to Delhi.
Senior leaders accepted that the party was “keenly watching” developments related to the Congress-AAP alliance. With the two parties “almost reaching” a consensus for Delhi, BJP also decided to finalise its own election strategy. “The central leadership may make some tweaks in the list keeping in view the alliance. The leadership may replace a few sitting MPs in view of a joint opposition,” a senior leader said.
BJP has got several feedback surveys of its sitting MPs and the probable candidates done in the last few weeks, which, said sources, would form the basis of candidate selection. With strong anti-incumbency in some of the seats, sources added that the party will have to make major changes. “If the alliance does not take place, we may have more sitting MPs re-nominated,” the leader said.
He added that the party had replaced almost two-thirds of its MPs across the country.
In 2014, BJP had won all seven seats in Delhi.
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