Gujarat elections 2017: BJP declares list, Rupani to contest from Rajkot

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Friday declared its first list of 70 candidates for the Gujarat Assembly polls with Chief Minister Vijay Rupani being nominated to contest from his traditional Rajkot West constituency.

Deputy Chief Minister Nitin Patel will contest from Mehsana, his traditional constituency, while state BJP chief Jitubhai Vaghani will contest from Bhavnagar West.

Gujarat will have two-phased polls on December 9 and 14. The first phase will cover 89 constituencies in 19 districts, and the second phase 93 seats in 14 districts.

The list comes days after the deliberations at the BJP Central Election Committee attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi under the presidentship of party chief Amit Shah.

The filing of nominations for the polls began on November 14.

Counting of votes will be taken up along with that of Himachal Pradesh on December 18.