BJP leaders brainstorm over Lok Sabha poll candidates

luding Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Rajasthan and Uttarakhand. Similar meetings with leaders from Uttar Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Telangana have already been held.

New Delhi: The BJP on Wednesday brainstormed over the party’s probable candidates in many states for the Lok Sabha elections, a day before its Central Election Committee is expected to meet to finalise the names for the first list of party nominees. Home Minister Amit Shah and BJP national president J P Nadda held separate meetings with party leaders from several states, inc

luding Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Rajasthan and Uttarakhand. Similar meetings with leaders from Uttar Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Telangana have already been held.

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The first list, party sources said, is expected to include the names of heavyweights like Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Shah but may also have the names of candidates for many seats which were not won by the BJP in the 2019 polls.

The first list for the 2019 elections had also included Modi and Shah, who was then the party’s national president and had made his Lok Sabha poll debut from Gandhinagar.

There is a view within the party that its candidates for the polls may have a more youthful profile in line with its leadership thrust in this direction.

While the lists of names in 2019 were released only after the Election Commission had announced the poll schedule, it is going to be different this time as the BJP looks to follow the template seen during the latest round of assembly polls in five states when it named its candidates, especially in the seats the party had lost five years earlier, before the announcement of poll dates.

Modi has set a target of winning 370 seats for the BJP in the Lok Sabha polls, expected to be held in April-May, and of over 400 for the ruling National Democratic Alliance.