Chandigarh: The ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Tuesday announced the candidates for the remaining four Lok Sabha seats in Punjab three of its sitting legislators and an ex-MLA of Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD). With this, the party is contesting all the 13 Lok Sabha seats in Punjab. The AAP announced the name of its sitting Mukatsar MLA Jagdeep Singh Kaka Brar for the Ferozepur seat, Batala MLA Amansher Singh Shery Kalsi from Gurdaspur Lok Sabha constituency and Ludhiana central MLA Ashok Parashar Pappu for Ludhiana Lok Sabha seat.
The AAP has fielded Pawan Kumar Tinu, a former MLA of SAD, who had recently left the SAD a few days ago and joined AAP, from Jalandhar (SC) seat.
With this, AAP has become the first party to have announced its candidates for all the 13 constituencies in the state. In its previous two lists, the party had announced nine Lok Sabha candidates.
For the record, five Cabinet ministers of the AAP government are contesting elections in Punjab Gurmeet Singh Meet Hayer from Sangrur Lok Sabha seat, Gurmeet Singh Khuddian from Bathinda, Kuldeep Singh Dhaliwal from Amritsar, Laljit Singh Bhullar from Khadoor Sahib and Dr Balbir Singh from Patiala seat. AAP also fielded Raj Kumar Chabbewal from Hoshiarpur, Gurpreet Singh GP from Fatehgarh Sahib, Karamjit Singh Anmol from Faridkot and AAP Punjab chief spokesperson Malvinder Singh Kang from Anandpur Sahib Lok Sabha seat.
BJP Announces 3 More Candidates In Punjab
Meanwhile the BJP on Tuesday announced the names of three more of its candidates for the Lok Sabha polls in Punjab, replacing Union minister Som Parkash with his wife Anita Som Parkash from Hoshiarpur (SC) Lok Sabha seat.
The saffron party's Vijay Sampla had won the Hoshiarpur seat in 2014 while Som Parkash won in 2019 defeating Congress' Raj Kumar Chabbewal. Hoshiarpur has been one of the three seats, the BJP fought when in alliance with Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) till 2020 when the latter snapped ties with BJP. Anita Som Parkash would face AAP candidate Chhabewal. BJP has named former bureaucrat Parampal Kaur Sidhu from Bathinda seat, currently held by three-time SAD MP Harsimrat Kaur Badal, wife of SAD chief Sukhbir Badal. SAD has not named its candidate to this date. Likewise, BJP also announced the name of Manjit Singh Manna Mianwind, a former SAD MLA, from the Khadoor Sahib seat.
