India
pti-Deepika S
Kolkata, Mar 05: West Bengal”s ruling Trinamool Congress on Friday stole a march on its rivals, the BJP and the Left-Congress-ISF alliance, by coming out with the party”s full list of 291 candidates, bringing in 114 new faces in a bid to beat the decade-old anti-incumbency.
Announcing the candidate list, TMC supremo and Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said that the remaining three seats of the 294 constituencies would be fought by its ally, the Bimal Gurung faction of the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM).
Reaching out to the politically crucial 49 per cent women voters and 30 per cent minority population, the TMC”s list has 50 women and 42 members of the minority community.
Besides, Banerjee fielded 79 Scheduled Caste and 17 Scheduled Tribe candidates.
Altogether 28 sitting MLAs, including five ministers, faced the axe because of age factor or poor health.
The feisty TMC…