Madhya Pradesh bypolls: BJP, Cong release list of 'star campaigners'

Bhopal, Oct 25 (IANS) The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress on Friday released their list of 'star campaigners' for the upcoming by-elections in two Assembly seats -- Budhni and Vijaypur -- in Madhya Pradesh. 

The candidates of both parties filed their nomination papers on Friday.

The list of BJP's 'star campaigners' includes the names of Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Mohan Yadav, Union Ministers Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Jyotiraditya Scindia and Virendra Kumar, Deputy CMs Rajendra Shukla and Jagdish Devda, state BJP chief V.D. Sharma and several ministers.

The Congress' 'star campaigners' list includes party's mostly senior leaders in the state including former Chief Ministers Digvijaya Singh and Kamal Nath. Others prominent names include former Union Minister Kantilal Bhuria, Rajya Sabha MP Vivek Tankha, state Congress chief Jitu Patwari, former ministers Sajjan Singh Verma, Kamaleshwar Patel and others.

In Vijaypur seat in Sheopur district, which is part of Morena Lok Sabha constituency, will be between the BJP's Ramniwas Rawat and Congress' Mukesh Malhotra.

The bypoll was necessitated after Ramniwas Rawat, who had won this seat on Congress' ticket in November 2023, resigned from the party and the Assembly. Rawat then joined the BJP, and at currently, he is the state Forest Minister in Chief Minister Mohan Yadav-led Cabinet.

While in Budhni, the contest will be between BJP's Ramakant Bhargava and Congress' Rajkumar Patel, who had won this seat for the Congress last time in 1998.

Budhni is the bastion of former Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who is currently the Union Minister.

Shivraj Singh Chouhan won the Budhni Assembly seat from 2006 to 2023. He has also been a four-time Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister.

In 2024, the BJP fielded Shivraj Singh Chouhan in the Lok Sabha polls, and he won comfortably.

Subsequently, he was made the Union Agriculture Minister and resigned from his Assembly membership from the Budhni constituency, necessitating the bypoll.

The voting will be held on November 13 while the ballots will be counted on November 23, as per the Election Commission of India.