Ahead of five Assembly elections in four states and a union territory over the next few weeks, PM Narendra Modi is chairing a meeting of the BJP's Central Election Committee in Delhi, to work on and maybe finalise a first list of candidates. As the party gears up for the polls in Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, Bengal and Assam, Party chief JP Nadda, Home Minister Amit Shah and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh are among those present for the meeting.
As per PTI, the party is prioritising to finalise candidates for the first two phases of elections in Assam and Bengal, both of which will be March 27 and April 1. Another meeting is expected to happen on March 5.
Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal and cabinet minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, the BJP's go-to man in the northeast, and state chief Ranjeet Kumar Dass will give their inputs for their respective states.
On March 3, Mr Ghosh said Bengal BJP had shortlisted around four to five names per seat for the first two phases.
Nandigram, which was the epicentre of a farmers' movement is one of the Bengal constituencies voting in the second phase. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said that she will be contesting from there.
Last month BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari accused Mamata Banerjee of wanting to turn Bengal into Bangladesh, and earlier the Chief Minister slammed "the most rotten MLAs", in a stinging swipe at the latter.
Suvendu Adhikari has welcomed the challenge and said he will defeat Mamata Banerjee.
In Assam, where the party came to power for the first time in 2016, the BJP has been pushing hard to retain power, as the Congress joins hands with regional parties to re-gain its power.
