Congress releases second list for Lok Sabha election; Priya Dutt, Raj Babbar, Savitri Phule get ticket

Congress on late Wednesday evening released the second list of candidates for Lok Sabha election comprising of 21 candidates. The party announced candidates for 16 seats in Uttar Pradesh and five seats in Maharashtra.

Uttar Pradesh Congress chief Raj Babbar will contest from Moradabad constituency, former BJP MP Savitri Phule will contest from Bahraich (Uttar Pradesh), and former MP Priya Dutt will contest from Maharashtra's Mumbai North-Central constituency.

The Congress fielded Nana Patole from Nagpur (Maharashtra), Milind Murli Deora from Mumbai South (Maharashtra), Sushil Kumar Shinde from Solapur-SC (Maharashtra), and Namdev Dalluji Usendi from Gadchiroli-Chimur ST (Maharashtra).

Congress leaders Sriprakash Jaiswal will be contesting from Kanpur (Uttar Pradesh), Sanjay Singh from Sultanpur (Uttar Pradesh), Omwati Devi Jatav from Nagina-SC (Uttar Pradesh), and Zafar Ali Naqvi from Kheri (Uttar Pradesh).

Kaisar Jahan will fight from Sitapur (Uttar Pradesh), Manjari Rahi from Misrikh-SC (Uttar Pradesh), Ramashankar Bhargava from Mohanlalganj- SC (Uttar Pradesh), and Ratna Singh from Pratapgarh (Uttar Pradesh).

Rakesh Sachan from Fatehpur (Uttar Pradesh), Parvez Khan from Sant Kabir Nagar (Uttar Pradesh), Kush Saurabh from Bansgaon-SC (Uttar Pradesh), Pankaj Mohan Sonkar from Lalganj-SC (Uttar Pradesh), Lalitesh Pati Tripathi from Mirzapur (Uttar Pradesh), and lastly Bhagwati Prasad Choudhary from Robertsganj-SC (Uttar Pradesh).

On March 7, Congress released the first list of 15 candidates for the election. The first list, finalised at a meeting of the party's central election committee chaired by Rahul Gandhi, named 11 candidates from Uttar Pradesh and four from Gujarat.

UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi will contest from Uttar Pradesh's Raebareli constituency and Congress president Rahul Gandhi will contest from Uttar Pradesh's Amethi constituency.

Former Union ministers Salman Khurshid, Jitin Prasad and R P N Singh have been fielded from their traditional seats of Farrukhabad, Dhaurahra and Kushi Nagar respectively.

Former Uttar Pradesh Congress chief Nirmal Khatri will contest from Faizabad, while Bharatsinh M Solanki, the party's ex-chief of the Gujarat unit, has been fielded from the state's Anand constituency. 

Congress leader Raju Parmar will contest from the Ahmedabad West-SC constituency, Prashant Patel from the Vadodara constituency, and Ranjit Mohansinh Rathwa from the Chhota Udaipur-ST constituency, all in Gujarat.

In Uttar Pradesh, Imran Masood from the Saharanpur constituency, Saleem Iqbal Shervani from the Badaun constituency, Annu Tandon from the Unnao constituency, Rajaram Pal from the Akbarpur constituency, Brij Lal Khabri from the Jalaun-SC constituency, and Nirmal Khatri from the Faizabad constituency.