A day after the ruling BJP had announced the names of candidates for all 43 segments of Jammu province, the Congress party released late Monday the names of 18 candidates for the third phase of Assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir.
The majority of these candidates are from Jammu province where the Congress has a direct fight with BJP.
Except for Langate, Sopore, and Waroora-Keerari, 15 candidates were announced for four districts of Jammu province namely Jammu, Samba, Kathua, and Udhampur districts where polling will be held on the last and final phase on October 1.
Six former ministers namely Raman Bhalla, Choudhary Lal Singh, Mula Ram, Dr Manohar Lal, Yogesh Sawhney, and Yash Kundal have been given mandates to contest the Assembly elections.
Acting president of the Jammu and Kashmir Pradesh Congress Committee (JKPCC) chief Raman Bhalla will contest the election from the newly carved RS Pura-Jammu South Assembly constituency where BJP has fielded its national secretary Dr. Narindra Singh Raina, who is a professor in Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agriculture Science and Technology (SKUAST) Jammu.
Two-time Lok Sabha member and former minister Choudhary Lal Singh has been given the party mandate for the Basholi Assembly segment where he will fight against BJP's Darshan Choudhary.
Choudhary Lal Singh represented the Basholi Assembly segment in the 1996, 2002, and 2014 elections as Congress Tiwari, Congress, and BJP candidate respectively.
In the last Assembly elections in 2014, Choudhary Lal Singh won this seat as a candidate of BJP.
Name of former Deputy Chief Minister missing from list
The name of former Deputy Chief Minister and party stalwart Tara Chand is missing from the list as the party has not yet made a decision on the Akhnoor and Chhamb Assembly segment.
Tara Chand is seeking a mandate on the Chhamb Assembly segment but his candidature is opposed by youth leader Satish Sharma.
Tara Chand represented the Chhamb Assembly segment in 1996, 2002, and 2008 but now this segment has been opened for the general category.
Sources said that the party wanted him to shift to the neighbouring Akhnoor Assembly segment reserved for the Scheduled Caste but the former Deputy Chief Minister is adamant about the Chhamb seat.
Once a staunch supporter of Ghulam Nabi Azad, Tara Chand resigned from the Congress and joined Azad's Democratic Progressive Azad Party in September 2022.
Within three months after joining the party, Tara Chand dumped his political mentor Ghulam Nabi Azad, and returned to the Congress party.
