Congress Says Kahjuraho Candidates Forced To Pull Out, BJP Denies Claim

Madhya Pradesh Congress chief Jitu Patwari on Sunday alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was pressuring some of the candidates in the Khajuraho Lok Sabha seat to withdraw from the poll fray.

The BJP, however, termed the allegations as baseless and said such claims were a cover-up for the internal conspiracies of the opposition INDIA bloc.

The Congress has given the Khajuraho Lok Sabha seat to the Samajwadi Party (SP) as part of the seat-sharing agreement among the INDIA alliance constituents.

The nomination form of SP candidate Meera Yadav, however, was rejected by the Returning Officer on Friday as she had failed to sign at one place and also submitted an old voters' list copy.

After the scrutiny, 14 candidates are in fray in this seat, including sitting MP and BJP state president VD Sharma.

Talking to reporters on Sunday, Patwari claimed the All India Forward Bloc candidate RB Prajapati, a former government officer, met him and said he is being pressured through different tactics to withdraw his nomination.

Prajapati has made a complaint in this regard to the Election Commission, Patwari said.

The Congress leader said the BJP is using tactics, which are generally heard of in panchayat elections, in the biggest election of the country.

"The district collector (returning officer) is acting like a BJP worker and invalidated the form of SP candidate and the issue will be fought legally...but the remaining candidates are being pressured. I got the information that some of them were abducted, some were forced to go underground, nobody can come to the public domain," Patwari claimed.

"Does the (state) BJP president want to contest the election in Bihari style, I beg your pardon, like filmi style that (the candidates) are abducted, being purchase with money, threatened, tormented through the administration, or anyhow getting forms of all candidates cancelled and get elected (unopposed)?" he said.

Patwari also asked if Prime Minister Narendra Modi wanted this type of a country.

The Congress leader demanded that the Election Commission of India provide security to the candidates.

Asked about the allegations, state BJP secretary Rajneesh Agrawal told PTI that the rejection of SP candidate's nomination from the Khajuraho seat has brought to fore the internal wranglings of the INDIA bloc.

"The internal strife and conspiracies of the Congress and the INDI bloc have come out in the open after rejection of the SP candidate's nomination. To cover it up, they are making baseless allegations," he said.

Agrawal said there is no basis for such allegations as the BJP is already contesting the election.

"The BJP was winning elections earlier and will win now also," he added.

Elections to the 29 Lok Sabha seats in MP will be held in four phases from April 19 to May 13.

Khajuraho and six other seats will be covered in the second phase of voting on April 26 and the last day of filing nominations for these constituencies was April 4. 

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)