BJP fields Sunny Deol from Gurdaspur, Kirron Kher gets ticket from Chandigarh

The saffron party has also fielded Som Prakash from Hoshiarpur Lok Sabha seat.

BJP on Tuesday released its 26th list of candidates for three parliamentary constituencies in Chandigarh and Punjab. Actor-turned-politician Sunny Deol, who joined the BJP on Tuesday morning, will contest from Gurdaspur and another actor-turned-politician and sitting MP Kirron Kher is in the fray from Chandigarh. The saffron party has fielded Som Prakash from Hoshiarpur Lok Sabha seat.

BJP releases 26th list of candidates for 3 #LokSabhaElections2019 seats in Chandigarh & Punjab. Sunny Deol to contest from Gurdaspur, Som Prakash from Hoshiarpur, and Kirron Kher from Chandigarh. pic.twitter.com/ca0C239gwO — ANI (@ANI) April 23, 2019

Earlier, Sunny Deol was welcomed to the party by senior BJP leaders Nirmala Sitharaman, Piyush Goel, Captain Abhimanyu and others.

Talking to media after formally joining the BJP, Sunny Deol hailed Prime Minister Narendra Modi and said that he has decided to join the BJP as he wants to work for the welfare of the country with PM Modi. "I am here today to work with and support Modi ji. My work will do the talking," Sunny told reporters.

It may be recalled that Sunny, 62, had met BJP president Amit Shah at Pune airport last week and the meeting had sparked speculations that the Bollywood star would join the BJP soon.

Talking about Sunny's meeting the Amit Shah, Yogesh Gogawale, BJP district president, Pune, had said that meeting was scheduled. "It was a scheduled meeting. Amit Shah came to Baramati as per the scheduled programme. When he was at the airport, Sunny Deol was also there. He met Amit Shah for five minutes," he told news agency ANI.

It is interesting to note that Sunny Deol's father and veteran actor Dharmendra had contested and won from Bikaner in Rajasthan on a BJP ticket.  Dharmendra's wife Hema Malini is a BJP MP from Mathura and she was in the fray this time too.  

Sunny has acted in several patriotic movies which struck the right chord with the viewers. Some of his notable movies which are based on the theme of patriotism are Indian, Gadar, The Hero: Love Story Of A Spy, Border, Heroes, Ma Tujhe Salaam, Farz etc.

All 10 seats of Punjab are scheduled to go to polls in the last phase on May 19. The counting of votes will take place on May 23.