BJP legislator Eatala Rajender is set to take on Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao in the Gajwel constituency in the November 30 assembly polls, according to the first list of candidates released by the BJP on Sunday.
Three of the BJP's sitting Lok Sabha members - Bandi Sanjay Kumar (former Telangana BJP chief and Karimnagar MP), Dharmapuri Arvind (Nizamabad MP) and Soyam Bapu Rao (Adilabad MP) will contest in the elections.
Sitting BJP legislator T Raja Singh, whose suspension was revoked, will contest from the Goshamahal segment in the city, his present constituency.
"I express my heartfelt gratitude to the BJP Leadership for nominating me as the Bharatiya Janata Party's candidate in the #Goshamahal Constituency for the upcoming 2023 legislative assembly election," Mr Singh said in a message posted on "X".
In August last year, Raja Singh was suspended from the party following his alleged controversial remarks against "Islam and Prophet Mohammed" in a video which was later pulled down by the social media platform on which it was uploaded.
The BJP leadership revoked the suspension of Raja Singh considering his explanation in response to the show cause notice served by the party earlier, Telangana BJP chief G Kishan Reddy said in a statement on Sunday.
Besides Gajwel, Eatala Rajender will also contest from Huzurabad, which he is representing now.
Mr Rajender had earlier indicated that if the party's senior leadership permits, he will take on KCR in Gajwel, which is currently represented by the Bharat Rashtra Samithi chief.
Sanjay Kumar has been fielded from Karimnagar while two other MPs, Soyam Bapu Rao and Dharmapuri Arvind, will contest from Boath and Koratla respectively.
Rani Rudrama Reddy was fielded against BRS working president and KCR's son KT Rama Rao in Sircilla.
According to the BJP list, K Venkata Ramana Reddy will contest against the chief minister in Kamareddy constituency.
KCR will contest from two segments in the upcoming polls - the Gajwel and Kamareddy assembly constituencies.
In the list of 52, BJP gave tickets to 12 women contestants.
On the party's strategy of fielding three MPs for assembly polls, senior BJP leader N Ramchander Rao said the party looked into the potentiality of the candidates.
"Basically, the BJP's idea is to have potential candidates so that the chances of winning are more and also more representation in the assembly," the BJP leader told PTI.
He further said the party would not like to take chances by fielding new faces.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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