On Wednesday, the BJP made a surprising decision to replace two-time sitting Member of Parliament Kirron Kher with Sanjay Tandon as its candidate for the Chandigarh Lok Sabha seat.
Sanjay Tandon, aged 60, hails from a prominent political family in Punjab, is the son of the former governor of Chattisgarh Balramji Das Tandon. He has a long history within the Bharatiya Janata Party, serving as the Chandigarh party president from 2010 to 2019.
The announcement caught many factions within the Chandigarh BJP off guard, as they had advocated for a local candidate to be nominated. Various party leaders, including Sanjay Tandon and former president Arun Sood, had been vying for the candidacy. Some expressed reservations about Tandon’s selection, particularly since the local committee had not recommended Kirron Kher’s name.
Tandon had been seeking a ticket for quite some time. Still, internal divisions within the party led to the nomination of Kirron Kher as a “parachute candidate” in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. Despite Kher’s claims of belonging to Chandigarh, she was often labeled as an “outsider” by certain factions within the BJP.
In the 2014 general election, Kher secured 1.91 lakh votes, defeating Congress leader Pawan Kumar Bansal, who garnered 1.21 lakh votes. AAP candidate Gul Panag also performed well, receiving 1.08 lakh votes in Chandigarh.
In 2019, Kirron Kher was once again nominated by the BJP and emerged victorious with 2.31 lakh votes, while Bansal received 1.84 lakh votes. However, the Aam Aadmi Party’s vote share significantly decreased in 2019, with just 3 percent of the votes going to Harmohan Dhawan, totaling 13,781 votes.
