Manish Sisodia has held the Patparganj seat, part of the East Delhi Lok Sabha constituency, since 2013. He was first elected in the December 2013 Delhi Assembly elections, where he defeated BJP’s Nakul Bhardwaj.
In Brief:
- AAP announces second list of 20 candidates for upcoming Delhi Assembly elections.
- Manish Sisodia, who has represented Patparganj since 2013, will now contest from Jangpura.
- The party also fields former BJP and Congress leaders, including new entrant Avadh Ojha, who will contest from Sisodia’s current constituency.
Manish Sisodia, who was first elected from Patparganj in the December 2013 Delhi Assembly elections after defeating BJP’s Nakul Bhardwaj, will now move to Jangpura for the upcoming polls.
In the February 2015 elections, Sisodia defeated BJP’s Vinod Kumar Binny, and in the 2020 elections, he won against the saffron party’s Ravinder Singh Negi.
According to the candidates’ list, 18 out of the 20 seats feature new faces, including Avadh Ojha, a prominent UPSC coach and educator who joined AAP on December 2. Ojha hails from Gonda, Uttar Pradesh.
Sources reveal that the decision to field Ojha from Patparganj was influenced by the changing demographics of the seat, with a focus on the Purvanchali community, which accounts for roughly 42% of Delhi’s electorate.
This community has significant influence in nearly half of Delhi’s 70 Assembly constituencies, including key areas like Burari, Laxmi Nagar, and Dwarka. The Purvanchal region covers the eastern part of Uttar Pradesh and the western part of Bihar.
Other notable names on the list include Mukesh Goel, a sitting councillor and key strategist for AAP in the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, who will contest from Adarsh Nagar. Also featured is Punardeep Singh Sawhney, son of current MLA Parlad Singh Sawhney, who will run from Chandni Chowk.
The list also includes Jintender Singh Shunty (Shahdara) and Surinder Pal Singh Bittu (Timarpur), both of whom recently left the BJP to join AAP.
Shunty will replace the outgoing MLA and Speaker, Ram Niwas Goel, while Bittu has been nominated in place of Dilip Pandey, AAP’s chief whip in the Assembly.
Today’s announcement follows the release of AAP’s first list of 11 candidates, which prominently included six leaders who recently joined the party from the BJP and Congress.
Former BJP leaders Brahm Singh Tanwar, Anil Jha, and BB Tyagi, along with ex-Congress leaders Chaudhry Zubair Ahmad, Veer Dhingan, and Sumesh Shokeen, have been nominated to contest the upcoming elections.
The elections for the 70-member Delhi Assembly are expected to be held in January 2025.
