LS Polls: Cong's Fourth List of 46 Candidates out; Digvijay, Karti, Danish Among Prominent Faces

The Congress's fourth list contains candidates from Assam, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Manipur, Mizoram, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, and West Bengal.

New Delhi: Congress released its fourth list of 46 candidates for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections. Uttar Pradesh Congress chief Ajay Rai, who will contest for the third time in Lok Sabha, is pitted against Prime Minister Narendra Modi from Varanasi.

The BJP's first list of 194 candidates announced on March 2 comprised PM Modi's name. As per the list, Congress leader and former Madhya Pradesh chief minister Digvijay Singh will be contesting from the Rajgarh Lok Sabha constituency against BJP candidate Rodmal Nagar.

Meanwhile, former Member of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly Imran Masood will contest the Lok Sabha elections from Saharanpur, Virender Rawat from Haridwar, and former Bahujan Samaj Party leader Danish Ali has been fielded from the Amroha Lok Sabha constituency.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, PM Modi secured the Varanasi seat with a margin of 4.80 lakh votes, defeating Shalini Yadav of the Samajwadi Party. Rai, despite only garnering 1,52,548 votes and finishing in third place, remains unfazed in the upcoming electoral battle.

In Tamil Nadu, the party has fielded Congress leader and P Chidambaram's son Karti Chidambaram, from the Sivaganga Lok Sabha seat. B Manickam Tagore, the incumbent MP from the Virudhunagar constituency, has been re-nominated for the same seat in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.

In Madhya Pradesh, the party has fielded Kantilal Bhuria for the Ratlam Lok Sabha seat. From Maharashtra, the party has fielded Vikas Thakare for the Nagpur Lok Sabha seat. In Uttar Pradesh, the party has also fielded Pradeep Jain Aditya from Jhansi and Akhilesh Pratap Singh from Deoria.

The list contains candidates from seats in Assam, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Manipur, Mizoram, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, and West Bengal. The party also released the first list of 18 candidates for the upcoming Sikkim Assembly polls on Friday.

The election for 543 Lok Sabha seats will be held in seven phases starting April 19. Nearly 97 crore voters are eligible to cast votes in the general election. Various parties have declared their initial lists for the elections, which will conclude on June 1. The counting of votes will take place on June 4.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha election, the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) won 303 seats, while the Indian National Congress (INC) managed to get only 52 seats. In the 2014 Lok Sabha election, the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) won 282 seats, while the Indian National Congress (INC) managed to get only 44 seats.

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