Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) on Wednesday released its first list of 35 candidates for the Jharkhand Assembly elections, with Chief Minister Hemant Soren Barhet and Kalpana Soren contesting from the Gandey seat.
Assembly elections will be held in two phases on November 13 and 20 and the election results will be declared on November 23. Hemant Soren is the MLA from Barhet (reserved) constituency of Sahibganj district. He won the seat in the 2019 assembly elections by 25,740 votes from his nearest rival Simon Malto of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Soren’s wife Kalpana Soren had defeated BJP’s Dilip Kumar Verma by 27,149 votes in the by-election from Gandeya seat. This seat had become vacant due to the resignation of JMM MLA Sarfaraz Ahmed.
According to this list released by JMM, outgoing Chief Minister’s brother Basant Soren is contesting from Dumka, Jharkhand Assembly Speaker Rabindranath Mahato from Nala, Minister Mithilesh Thakur from Garhwa, Sonu Sudivya from Giridih and Baby Devi from Dumri.
Basant Soren had defeated former BJP minister Lewis Marandi from Dumka seat by over 6,842 votes. The list of candidates released by JMM includes Deepak Birua from Chaibasa and Kedar Hazara, three-time BJP MLA from Jamua. Hazara has recently joined the party.