No BJP list even at party's poll body meeting on Thursday night

New Delhi: The BJP central election committee meeting which started on Thursday late evening ended little after 11 p.m., but no names of candidates for the upcoming Delhi assembly polls were declared.

It is believed the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will either release a first set of candidate list comprising more than 40 names or in its entirety on Friday.

Thursday late evening's meeting was attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, BJP President Amit Shah, working President JP Nadda, Union Ministers Rajnath Singh, Nitin Gadkari, Thawarchand Gehlot and former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan among others.

In fact, PM Modi left the BJP headquarters, where the meeting was taking place, around 11.40 p.m, after the late night central election committee (CEC) meeting.

The Delhi unit sent two names for each constituencies after filtering and the CEC was mandated to make the final pick for candidates for 70 assembly constituencies of Delhi.

Earlier this week, Amit Shah held a series of BJP core group meeting at his residence, some of which ran till 3 a.m. in the morning, to shortlist names. Party's working president J.P. Nadda, General Secretary (organisation) B.L. Santosh, party's Delhi in-charge Prakash Javadekar, state President Manoj Tiwari among others were present in that meeting.

A section of the central BJP leadership wants giving a chance to fresh faces as such candidates don't carry any "baggage". The move could also send a positive message among the party cadre.

In the 2017 MCD elections, the party had not given ticket to a single sitting councillor. Sources said the party may not go that far in the Assembly polls, given factionalsm in the party. But a strong pitch is being made from within the central BJP to give a sizeable share of tickets to young candidates.

Delhi will go to poll on February 8 and the results will be out on February 11.