Union ministers Tomar, Patel, Kulaste, several MPs in BJP's 2nd list of candidates for Madhya Pradesh polls

The BJP on Monday fielded Union ministers Narendra Singh Tomar, Prahlad Singh Patel and Phaggan Singh Kulaste, and several other party MPs for the Madhya Pradesh assembly polls as it released its second list of 39 candidates.

Besides the ministers, the MPs fielded for the polls are Rakesh Singh, Ganesh Singh, Riti Pathak and Uday Pratap Singh, all from Lok Sabha. BJP national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya will contest from the Indore-1 assembly constituency.

The decision to field Vijayvargiya has dimmed the chances of his MLA son Akash Vijayvargiya, who had won from Indore-3 in 2018, from being given the party ticket again as the BJP has generally avoided making members of the same family its candidate in elections.

Union minister Tomar has been fielded from the Dimani constituency, Patel from Narsingpur and Kulaste from the Niwas seat.

By fielding several Union ministers and MPs, the party has raised the stakes for the assembly polls and underscored its determined bid to retain power in the state amid a strong challenge from the Congress.

Most of them have been winning their Lok Sabha seats for multiple terms. With the second list, the BJP has named its candidates in 78 seats for the election to the 230-member assembly, likely to be held in November-December. It had released its first list of 39 candidates last month. The election schedule is yet to be announced.

In the 2018 assembly polls, the Congress had won 114 seats, while the BJP got 109. However, the Congress government fell after many MLAs under the leadership of Jyotiraditya Scindia, who later became a Union minister, joined the BJP.

The BJP returned to power in March 2020 with Shivraj Singh Chouhan as chief minister for a fresh term. The BJP's current strength in the assembly is 127.

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