2016 Assam Assembly Elections - BJP announces names of 88 candidates Wednesday March 09,2016

Important dates:

	Phase 1	Phase 2
Date of Issue of Gazette Notification	March 11	March 14
Last Date for Nominations	March 18	March 22
Date for Scrutiny of Nominations	March 19	March 24
Last date for withdrawal of candidatures	March 21	March 26
Date of poll	April 4	April 11
Counting	May 19	May 19

The BJP on Wednesday March 09,2016 announced the names of 88 candidates for the Assam Assembly polls including those of its chief ministerial candidate Sarbananda Sonowal, former Congress leader Himanta Biswa Sarma and Lok Sabha member Kamakhya Prasad Tasha, who has been fielded against Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi.

BJP's Central Election Committee (CEC) cleared the names for all but two of the 90 seats it will contest in the polls for the 126-member state Assembly.

Reversal of fortunes for AGP, BJP since poll debut in 1985

 

The AGP was born in 1985, soon after its members in their earlier avatar as student leaders signed the Assam Accord to end a six-year agitation to rid the state of illegal migrants. It rode an emotional wave to bag 67 of the 126 assembly seats in the year-ending election.
The BJP cut a sorry figure in that election. It could muster only 3.56% votes and 34 of its 37 contestants forfeited their deposits.
The AGP, however, was never the same. Its best performance since 1985 was in the 1996 election where it won 59 seats — five less than a simple majority in the House.
The BJP’s performance has improved since 1985 but it has never been able to win more than 10 seats (1991 and 2006) or more than 26.31% of the vote share that translated into only eight seats in 2001.
Much of BJP’s optimism this election is based on its 2014 Lok Sabha show where it won seven parliamentary seats riding the Narendra Modi wave.