BJP's Chhattisgarh nominees to be announced soon

Raipur, Oct 15 (UNI) The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will announce its candidates for the Chhattisgarh assembly polls before issuance of notification for the two-phase hustings.

''The party initiated the process related to ticket distribution quite sometime back. Meetings took place at block and constituency level. BJP teams -- that fanned out into districts for eliciting opinion regarding nominees -- have returned and submitted a report,'' BJP state General Secretary and spokesman Dharam Kaushik told UNI today.

Thirty-nine constituencies would witness polling on November 14 and the related notification would be issued on October 20 while 51 constituencies would witness polling on November 20 and the related notification would be issued on October 27.

''Party President Rajnath Singh undertook a visit here and BJP prime ministerial nominee L K Advani will address a rally at Bilaspur tomorrow. As the polls will take place a fortnight earlier than expected, the ticket distribution process will also be completed soon,'' Mr Kaushik said.

Pointing out that the State Election Committee would meet shortly, he added that the names would then be forwarded to the Central Election Committee for approval. The list would be released from Delhi.

Responding to a query, Mr Kaushik said, ''the Dr Raman Singh-led BJP government's work over the past five years, development-related achievements and the Chief Minister's image will be the issues. Price rise and terrorism during the Centre's United Progressive Alliance regime's tenure and injustice meted out to Chhattisgarh will be the chief issues.'' Replying to a question on whether former chief minister Ajit Jogi would also be made an issue, he said the main opposition Congress leader would definitely be an issue as his three-year rule would be contrasted with Dr R Singh's five-year tenure.

''The Congress making corruption an issue is ridiculous as that party's members lowered Parliament's prestige by offering bribes to save their government,'' Mr Kaushik added.

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