Hemant Soren.
Credit: PTI Photo
Ranchi: The Jharkhand Mukti Morcha released its first list of 35 candidates for the upcoming assembly polls on Wednesday, fielding Chief Minister Hemant Soren from Barhait and Kalpana Soren from Gandey segments.
The assembly polls will be held in two phases -- on November 13 and 20 -- while the results will be declared on November 23.
Hemant Soren is the sitting MLA from Barhait (ST) constituency in Sahibganj district. He won the seat by 25,740 votes over his nearest BJP rival Simon Malto in the 2019 assembly elections.
His wife Kalpana Soren had won the Gandey bypoll by 27,149 votes over her nearest BJP rival Dilip Kumar Verma. The seat had fallen vacant following the resignation of JMM MLA Sarfaraz Ahmad.
Of the 35 JMM nominees, Basant Soren, the incumbent chief minister's brother, will contest from Dumka, Jharkhand Assembly Speaker Rabindranath Mahto from Nala, Minister Mithilesh Thakur from Garhwa, Sonu Sudivya from Giridih and Bebi Devi from Dumri.
Basant defeated former BJP minister Lois Marandi by over 6,842 votes in party stronghold Dumka, the constituency vacated by his elder brother Hemant Soren after he won Dumka and Barahit in the December 2019 assembly elections and decided to retain the latter.
Assembly Speaker Mahto won Nala in Jamtara by a margin of 3,520 votes, defeating Satyanand Jha of the BJP in the last elections. Mahto had won the seat in 2005 and 2014 also.
The other candidates announced by the JMM include Dipak Birua from Chaibasa and Kedar Hazara, a three-term sitting MLA of BJP who joined the party recently, from Jamua.
Assembly Elections 2024 | The Maharashtra Assembly polls will take place against the backdrop of a fractured political landscape in the western state where the Shiv Sena and NCP will be going up against the Uddhav Thackeray and Sharad Pawar factions, even as the BJP and Congress try to make their mark. Meanwhile, in Jharkhand, the JMM faces a new challenge after Hemant Soren's recent arrest and Champai, a longstanding party member, joining the BJP. The Haryana election resulted in a shock loss for Congress, which was looking to galvanize on the Lok Sabha poll performance, while J&K also saw the grand old party eventually stepping away from the cabinet, with Omar Abdullah's JKNC forming government. It remains to be seen if the upcoming polls help BJP cement its position further or provide a fillip to I.N.D.I.A. Check live updates and track the latest coverage, live news, in-depth opinions, and analyses only on Deccan Herald.
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