Taranjit Sandhu, Preneet Kaur In BJP's 8th List; Sunny Deol Misses Out

The BJP announced its eighth list of candidates for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections on Saturday. The party has fielded former diplomat Taranjit Sandhu from the Amritsar seat and dropped actor and sitting MP Sunny Deol from Gurdaspur. This move comes as the party announced candidates for six of the 13 Lok Sabha seats in Punjab.

In a notable development, Hans Raj Hans, the incumbent BJP MP from Delhi's North-West constituency, has been shifted to Punjab and will now contest from the Faridkot Parliamentary seat.

Also, former Congress stalwarts Preneet Kaur and Ravneet Singh Bittu have emerged as key figures in the BJP's lineup. Kaur is set to contest from her traditional stronghold of Patiala, while Bittu will contest from Ludhiana.

Preneet Kaur, the wife of Punjab's former Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh, recently joined the BJP amidst the presence of top party leaders from the state.

In West Bengal, Dr. Pranat Tudu has been nominated as a candidate from Jhargram, while former IPS officer Debashish Dhar will contest from Birbhum. Dhar resigned from the police service citing personal reasons, while Dr. Tudu also recently resigned from the West Bengal Health Services. Dr. Tudu was serving as the medical officer at Jhargram Government Medical College and Hospital.

In the 2019 elections, the BJP secured two seats out of Punjab's 13. Sunny Deol won from Gurdaspur, defeating Jakhar, while former Indian Administrative Service officer Som Prakash emerged victorious from Hoshiarpur. However, former diplomat Hardeep Singh Puri faced defeat in the Amritsar constituency. Despite this, Puri is a BJP Rajya Sabha MP and serves as a Union minister.