Bhubaneswar: After keeping aspirants as well as others guessing for quite some time, BJD president and Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik today fielded Bhartruhari Mahtab from Cuttack Lok Sabha constituency. The party is yet to announce its candidates for Dhenkanal and Keonjhar parliamentary constituencies.
Apart from Mahtab, BJD announced candidates for nine assembly constituencies today. However, the party has changed the constituencies of several sitting MLAs.
Begunia MLA Prashant Jagdev has been nominated to contest from Chilika Assembly constituency while Rajendra Sahoo will contest from Begunia.
BJD has not granted ticket to its minister Sashi Bhusan Behera who is the sitting MLA from Jaydev Assembly constituency. The party has replaced Behera with Arabinda Dhali for Jaydev seat.
So far the BJD has announced candidates for 19 of the state's 21 Lok Sabha seats and 137 of the 147 Assembly seats. The simultaneous polls to Lok Sabha and Assembly elections in Odisha will be held on April 11, 18, 23 and 29.
Here is the list of 9 MLA candidates of BJD announced today:
Chilika – Prashant Jagdev
Jaydev – Arabinda Dhali
Begunia- Rajendra Kumar Sahu
Khurda – Jyotindra Nath Mitra
Deogarh – Romancha Ranjan Biswal
Basta – Nityananda Sahu
Rairangpur – Basanti Marandi
Moroda – Raj Kishore Dash
Bari – Sunanda Das