In an environment full of doubts regarding the announcement of party candidates by the major political parties BJP and Congress, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) yet again took a lead in announcing its second list of candidates for the first phase of Gujarat Assembly Elections 2017.
On October 21, the AAP had announced its first list, naming 11 candidates for Gujarat elections. The first list had names for the following seats; Anil Verma (Bapunagar), Ramesh Patel (Unjha), Rajesh Bhut (Rajkot – West), J J Mewada (Danilimda), Nimeesha Khunt (Gondal), M D Manajaria (Lathi), Arjun Rathva (Chhota Udaipur), Rajendra Patel (Padra), Hanif Jamadar (Karjan), Rajiv Pandey (Pardi) and Ram Dhaduk (Kamrej).
The list released on Thursday has the names of 10 candidates for seats which will go to polls on December 9. The list has candidates for Gandhinagar, Surat (East), Gandhidham and Jamnagar (Rural). The 10 chosen ones are: Gunvant Patel (Gandhinagar), Paresh Bhanderi (Jamnagar Rural), Ajit Lokhil (Rajkot East), Salim Multani (Surat East), Amjad Pathan (Bapunagar), Jilubhai Bavaliya (Botad), Nagajibhai Ambali (Katargam), Jignesh Mehta (Karanj), Ramesh Nabhani (Palanpur) and Govind Danicha (Gandhidham)
The AAP has declared that it will not fight on seats where it has weak party setup. The party has named businessman Rajesh Bhut from Rajkot (West) which is the seat from where Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani had won election last time and is expected to fight again.