Is Indore hold-up delaying BJP’s final list?

BHOPAL: Is it tug of war, or wait and watch? With Congress having announced 28 candidates – barring just

Indore

– the spotlight is back on BJP, and the uncertainty over tickets in eight crucial seats, including

Bhopal

and Indore.

Having conceded Congress a headstart in campaigning, BJP insists there is no dispute on tickets and that it is going to field heavyweights in all these seats.

BJP leaders pointed out to TOI on Saturday – after Congress announced three more candidates – that the saffron party has announced 408 Lok Sabha seats in the heartland, and kept 30 prominent seats on hold "for heavyweights".

Sources say there is a tug of war over Indore, and once that is cleared, everything else will fall into place. Speculation is rife that PM Narendra Modi might contest from one of the MP bastions, perhaps Indore or

Vidisha

, as second option after Varanasi.

BJP is likely to finalise the remaining eight seats after a crucial meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and

Lok Sabha Speaker

Sumitra Mahajan in Mhow on April 14, sources said on Saturday. If PM Modi contests from Indore, it will galvanise the BJP state unit that is smarting from the assembly election defeat.

“The party has kept 30 prominent seats in Delhi, MP and UP on hold due to reasons best known to the national leadership. The BJP parliamentary board has forwarded all names to Amit Shah ji for the final call. But, there is still time for polling in MP, which will begin on April 29,” national vice-president of BJP Yuva Morcha and state spokesperson Rahul Kothari told TOI.

Apart from Indore and Bhopal (where Digvijaya has a three-week headstart), BJP is in a dilemma over candidates for Khajuraho and Sagar. There are reasons behind holding back Guna, Dhar and Ratlam-Jhabua seats, but Vidisha, which is one of the safest saffron seats, there is no specific reason mentioned by the party. Vidisha, once represented by Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Shivraj Singh Chouhan, voted for Sushma Swaraj in 2009 and 2014.

In Bhopal, Congress candidate Digvijaya Singh has completed first round of campaigning, which is also causing distress among local BJP leaders, including former Rajya Sabha MP Raghunandan Sharma. Digvijaya’s campaign – where he has promised land to expand a Ram temple — has turned into an eyesore for saffron leaders who want to field Sadhvi Pragya or Uma Bharti from Bhopal.

While Sadhvi Pragya has volunteered to take on Digvijaya, Union minister Uma Bharti, who had said she won’t contest Lok Sabha polls this year, refused to comment on her candidature. “I will not reply to any query on my ticket from Bhopal as I am not ready to hear this question,” Bharti told reporters in Jhansi. Sources said that the firebrand leader is seeking the Khajuraho ticket, her old bastion.

BJP leaders told TOI that the remaining eight names will be cleared in a day or two. Till then, the party will continue to campaign in the name of PM Modi.