BJP releases third list; two Congress turncoats, Fadnavis' PA among 25 candidates

Mumbai: The BJP on Monday released its third list of 25 candidates for the Maharashtra assembly polls, giving tickets to two Congress turncoats and the personal assistant of Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis.

The BJP, so far, has announced candidates for 146 seats. Polls to the 288-member Maharashtra assembly will take place on November 20, while results will be declared on November 23.

Jitesh Antapurkar, who won a bypoll in 2021 on a Congress ticket and is considered close to former chief minister Ashok Chavan, has been nominated from Deglur. Chavan had left the Congress recently and joined the BJP, which made him a Rajya Sabha MP.

Archana Patil-Chakurkar, daughter-in-law of Congress veteran and former Lok Sabha Speaker Shivraj Patil, has been fielded from Latur City seat. She had joined the BJP from the Congress in March this year.

Sumit Wankhede, who has served as Fadnavis's personal assistant for several years, will be the BJP's candidate from Arvi assembly constituency.

Incidentally, the BJP had given Fadnavis' former PA Abhimanyu Pawar a ticket from Ausa in 2019. Pawar had won at the time. Later, Shreekant Bharatiya was made an MLC by the party.

Borivali BJP MLA Sunil Rane has been replaced with Sanjay Upadhyay, while MLC Praveen Datke has been fielded from Nagpur Central seat.

Ashish Deshmukh, son of former Congress state president Ranjeet Deshmukh, has been given a ticket from Savner in Nagpur district.

Sitting MLA Bharti Lavekar has been repeated from Versova seat in the western part of the metropolis.

The BJP's third list features four women, including Lavekar and Archana Patil-Chakurkar.

The other two are Sneha Dube, who has been fielded from Vasai seat in Palghar district, and Sai Prakash Dahake from Karanja in Washim.