Maharashtra Assembly Elections 2024 | Congress releases second list of 23 candidates

Mumbai/New Delhi: The Congress on Saturday announced its second list of candidates for the November 20 Maharashtra assembly elections, retaining sitting MLA Kailash Gorantyal from Jalna and fielding party leader Sunil Kedar's wife Anuja from the Saoner seat.

The list came after the party's Central Election Committee met and discussed the names of the candidates for the polls.

The Congress declared 48 candidates in its first list. With this list, it has now announced 71 candidates.

The party has fielded Anuja, the wife of party leader Sunil Kedar, who has been disqualified from contesting elections for six years after being convicted in the Nagpur District Central Cooperative Bank (NDCCB) scam.

She will battle it out from the Saoner seat in Nagpur district.

The opposition party has retained MLA Kailash Gorantyal from Jalna.

The party had retained 25 incumbent MLAs in its first list of nominees.

Senior party leader and former deputy speaker Vasant Purke, who lost the 2019 polls, has been fielded again from Ralegaon (Yavatmal), while Shivajirao Moghe, who lost in 2019, has made way for his son Jitendra from the Arni seat (Yavatmal).

In Mumbai, the party has announced the candidature of Kalu Badheliya from Kandivali East seat, Ganesh Yadav from Sion Koliwada and Yashwant Singh from Charkop.

Suresh Bhoyar will take on state BJP chief Chandrashekar Bawankule at Kamptee (Nagpur), while in Wardha, the party has fielded Shekhar Shende, son of former assembly speaker late Pramod Shende.

Speaking to reporters after the CEC meeting on Friday, party leader Ramesh Chennithala said the Congress CEC held a discussion on the remaining seats of Maharashtra.

"The MVA is contesting unitedly, and we have no differences," Chennithala, who is the All India Congress Committee (AICC) in-charge for Maharashtra, said.

"We will fight together to realise the dreams of the people of Maharashtra. We are confident that MVA will form the government. People are ready to throw out this corrupt government," Chennithala said.

PCC chief Nana Patole said the MVA will perform better in the Assembly polls than in the Lok Sabha polls, and the MVA will form a full majority government.

"We, the MVA, are all set to sweep the upcoming assembly elections," Venugopal said in a post on X after the deliberations.

He also shared pictures of the CEC meeting on the microblogging platform.

The Congress announced its first list of 48 candidates for the Maharashtra polls on Thursday, fielding Patole from Sakoli, former chief minister Prithviraj Chavan from Karad South and Leader of Opposition in the outgoing Assembly Vijay Wadettiwar from Brahmapuri.

Assembly Elections 2024 | The Maharashtra Assembly polls will take place against the backdrop of a fractured political landscape in the western state where the Shiv Sena and NCP will be going up against the Uddhav Thackeray and Sharad Pawar factions, even as the BJP and Congress try to make their mark. Meanwhile, in Jharkhand, the JMM faces a new challenge after Hemant Soren's recent arrest and Champai, a longstanding party member, joining the BJP. The Haryana election resulted in a shock loss for Congress, which was looking to galvanize on the Lok Sabha poll performance, while J&K also saw the grand old party eventually stepping away from the cabinet, with Omar Abdullah's JKNC forming government. It remains to be seen if the upcoming polls help BJP cement its position further or provide a fillip to I.N.D.I.A. Check live updates and track the latest coverage, live news, in-depth opinions, and analyses only on Deccan Herald.

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