By fielding such heavyweights, the party has raised the stakes for the assembly polls and underscored its determined bid to retain power in the state amid a strong challenge from the Congress.
Minister of state for rural development and steel Kulaste has been fielded from Niwas, agriculture minister Tomar will contest from Dimani, and minister of state for food processing industries and Jal Shakti Patel will be fighting from Narsingpur.
The party’s national general secretary, Kailash Vijayvargiya, has been fielded from his traditional Indore-1 seat.
Four other MPs will also be contesting the elections, including Ganesh Singh from Satna, Riti Pathak from Sidhi, Rakesh Singh from Jabalpur Paschim and Uday Pratap Singh from Gadarwara.
Madhya Pradesh, which has 230 assembly seats, is scheduled to go for polls later this year.
In the last assembly election in 2018, the Congress came to power and formed the government with senior leader Kamal Nath as the chief minister. However, the BJP formed the government in 2020 after a coup by then Congress leader Jyotiraditya Scindia who, along with 22 MLAs joined the BJP.
(With inputs from agencies)
