A day after the BJP announced the second list of candidates for the Lok Sabha elections and the party brought in some new faces surprising its party leaders, the suspense over the candidate for the Mandya seat continues with the JD(S), the saffron party’s alliance partner, insisting on the seat despite intense lobbying by Sumalatha Ambareesh, MP.
Ms. Sumalatha has expressed several times that the BJP will consider her candidature and she would fight the polls on the party symbol. She had met Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, and BJP National president J.P. Nadda with regard to her electoral fight on the party symbol.
The JD(S) is too confident of getting Mandya under the seat-sharing arrangement with the BJP, as former Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy is very specific about Mandya. Some JD(S) leaders in Mandya wanted either Mr. Kumaraswamy or his son Nikhil Kumaraswamy, who was defeated by Ms. Sumalatha in the last election, to contest.
