Bhubaneswar: The All India Congress Committee (AICC) today announced the names of candidates for 16 MLA seats and three Parliamentary Constituencies in Odisha.
The party, which had earlier declared the names of candidates for 17 out of 21 Lok Sabha seats, announced two new names and changed the aspirant in one constituency.
The party has fielded Binod Bihari Nayak from Keonjhar Lok Sabha constituency, while party nominee Dulal Chandra Pradhan to contest from Sambalpur Lok Sabha seat.
Dulal will contest against Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan and BJD stalwart Pranab Prakash Das for Sambalpur MP seat.
The grand old party has changed its candidate for Keonjhar MP segment, where it has nominated Binod Bihari Nayak in place of Mohan Hembram.
The party has nominated Amita Biswal for Jharsuguda, Suresh Routray’s elder son Siddharth Routray for Nimapara, and ex-BJD MLA Sipra Malliack for Kendrapara. Sonali Sahoo was nominated for Khurda Assembly segment after recently joining the Congress from the BJP.
Furthermore, the party made changes in candidates for three Assembly segments, nominating Sarat Kumar Pradhan, Krushna Sagaria, and Sanjay Kumar Mandal in place of Manoj Kumar Acharya, Jayant Kumar Bhoi, and Bipin Bihari Swain, respectively.
Other candidates announced for assembly seats are Kshirod Chandra Patra (Badasahi), Bibhu Bushan Rout (Sukinda), Ashok Pratihari (Rajanagar), Loknath Moharathy (Mahakalapada), Gyan Ranjan Patnaik (Pipili), Pradeep Kumar Swain (Chilika), Manoj Kumar Pradhan (Khandapada), Nakul Nayak (Daspalla), and Shayam Sundargarh Sahu (Gopalpur).
With this, Congress has now named candidates for 138 Assembly seats out of the total 147 in the State, while the ruling BJD and BJP have nominated aspirants for 135 and 131 seats, respectively
