Pune: Siddharth Shirole, Madhuri Misal, Chandrakant Patil, Mahesh Landge Confirmed; Ashwini Jagtap Denied Ticket; Jagdish Mulik's Name Missing from BJP's First List for Assembly Polls

Shivajinagar MLA Siddharth Shirole, Parvati MLA Madhuri Misal, and Bhosari MLA Mahesh Landge made it to the first list of candidates for the Maharashtra Assembly elections released by the BJP on Sunday.

However, incumbent Chinchwad MLA Ashwini Jagtap has been denied the party ticket, with her brother-in-law Shankar Jagtap, the party's Pimpri-Chinchwad chief, securing the candidature instead. From Daund, Rahul Kul is in race.

The BJP has confirmed its candidates for key constituencies, with Kothrud also featuring Chandrakant Patil in the lineup.

Shirole and Patil thanked the party for the chance.

Mulik's name absent

However, the name of Jagdish Mulik was absent from the first list of BJP candidates for the Wadgaon Sheri assembly constituency. For the uninitiated, Mulik is keen to contest from this seat and has made his intentions clear to the party leadership through interviews, posts, and activities. Currently, Sunil Tingre from the NCP (Ajit Pawar faction) serves as the MLA for this constituency.

Polls on Nov 20

The Election Commission announced that the election for the 288-member Maharashtra Assembly will take place in a single phase on November 20, with the counting of votes scheduled for November 23.

The BJP, which is allied with Eknath Shinde's Shiv Sena and the Ajit Pawar faction of the NCP, is entering the election on a high note following its recent victory in Haryana, where it overcame Congress.

In the 2019 Maharashtra Assembly elections, the BJP and Shiv Sena contested together as allies under the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), while Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) formed the United Progressive Alliance (UPA). The BJP-Shiv Sena alliance secured 161 seats (BJP 105, Shiv Sena 56), while the Congress-NCP alliance obtained 98 seats (NCP 54, Congress 44).