The BJP is learnt to have finalised a second list of nearly 150 candidates for the Lok Sab- ha elections following its second Central Election Committee (CEC) meeting that was convened late on Monday night.
The CEC meeting, which was attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and union minister Amit Shah and party president JP Nadda, among others, discussed nearly 100 candidates from Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Gujarat, Telangana, Karnataka and Chandigarh.
The CEC is expected to declare around 150 names as during its first meeting on February 29, it had also discussed an extra 100 candidates whose names were not announced in the first list of 195 names that was declared on March 2. In the first list, candidates were declared from 16 states and two union territories.
During the discussions at the CEC meeting, the remaining candidates from some states which had figured in the first list were also decided. Among all remaining 11 seats of Gujarat were discussed and seven candidates were finalised. Similarly, from Mad- hya Pradesh, the remaining five seats were discussed and candidates for four were de cided. The discussions also covered some new states which were not discussed in the first list. These included Maharashtra, from where 25 candidates were discussed.
From the southern states, BJP discussed the names of several candidates from Andhra Pradesh where it finalised a seat-sharing pact with Telugu Desam Party and Jana Sena Party on Monday. While Chandrababu Naidu- led TDP would contest 17 of the 25 seats and Pawan Kalyan's JSP two, BJP has been left with six seats. It discussed several candidates for these seats including former CM Kiran Kumar Reddy and senior leaders D Purandeswari, Y Satya Kumar, CM Ramesh and YS Chowdary
