The Jan Suraaj Party on Monday announced its second list of candidates for 65 constituencies for the Bihar assembly elections, but kept under wraps its choice for the Raghopur seat from where its founder Prashant Kishor is expected to take on Rashtriya Janata Dal's Tejashwi Yadav.
Addressing a press conference, Kishor said that with this, the party has named candidates for 116 of the state's 243 seats.
"In the first list, we had announced candidates for 51 seats, and in the second list, we named nominees for 65 seats. Candidates for the remaining seats will be announced later," he said.
Kishor said among the candidates announced so far, 31 belonged to the extremely weaker sections, 21 to Other Backwards Classes, and 21 are Muslims.
"The selection of candidates reflects the party's commitment to represent all sections of society," he said.
The party has fielded Kamlesh Paswan from Harnaut, a seat long considered CM Nitish Kumar's stronghold, though he hasn't contested an assembly election there in three decades.
Another notable name in the second list is advocate Abhay Kant Jha, who represented victims of the 1989 Bhagalpur communal riots. He will contest the elections from Bhagalpur.
Among the other prominent candidates are retired police officer Nasrullah Khan in Nokha (Rohtas), academic Shashikant Prasad in Phulwari, and Dr Shahnawaz in Barharia (Siwan).
Naval Kishore Chowdhary, a well-known economist, has been fielded from Bathnaha (SC) in Sitamarhi.
The party has also fielded Tathagat Harshvardhan, son of former Union minister KK Tiwary, in the Buxar seat. Tiwary, elected from the Buxar Lok Sabha seat in 1980 and 1984, was a minister in the Rajiv Gandhi government.
Among the party's Muslim candidates are Md Ekramul Haque (Thakurganj), Naaz Ahmad Khan alias Pappu Khan (Kesaria), and Aamir Haider (Bahadurpur).
In the ST-reserved seat of Manihari in Katihar district, it has fielded Bablu Soren.
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