Maharashtra Assembly Poll: Manikrao Thakare Among Congress's Third List Of 16 Candidates

Congress on Saturday released its third list of 16 candidates for the Maharashtra assembly elections which included senior leader Manikrao Thakare.

With the third list, the party has declared 87 candidates so far for the November 20 elections to the 288-member assembly. Its talks with allies NCP(SP) and Shiv Sena (UBT) for seat-sharing are still underway.

Thakare, a former state Congress chief and the party's present Goa in-charge, was fielded from Digras constituency in Yavatmal district.

Nanded South MLA Mohanrao Hambarde was retained, while Kolhapur North MLA Jayashri Jadhav was replaced with Rajesh Latkar.

Nivruttirao Kamble was fielded from Deglur in place of sitting MLA Jitesh Antapurkar who has crossed over to the BJP.

Lakhibhau Jadhav was fielded from Igatpuri in place of sitting MLA Hiraman Koskar who has switched his loyalties to the NCP.

Asif Zakaria would contest from Vandre West, taking on Mumbai BJP chief Ashish Shelar, while Congress general secretary Sachin Sawant was fielded from Andheri West.