Earlier, reports stated Gambhir was set to contest for the in the general elections from Delhi.
On Monday, the BJP announced that Gautam Gambhir and Meenakshi Lekhi would be contesting from East Delhi and New Delhi Lok Sabha Constituencies respectively.
Gambhir had joined BJP last month. There's a very interesting battle on the cards with Gambhir taking on Congress' Arvinder Singh Lovely and AAP's Aatishi Marlena.
Cricketer-turned-politician Gautam Gambhir on Tuesday held a roadshow here ahead of filling his nomination papers as the BJP Lok Sabha candidate from East Delhi.Amid loud cheers, Gambhir waved to hundreds of people during the roadshow.
"I really want to contribute something to the country and whatever our Prime Minister has done in the last five years. I want to take that legacy forward. I will try to work as much as I can with an honest heart and clear intentions," Gambhir told ANI.
A Padma Shri awardee, Gambhir joined the BJP on March 22 in the presence of Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.
In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, BJP's Mahesh Giri had defeated AAP's Rajmohan Gandhi by a margin of 1,90,463 votes from East Delhi seat.Meanwhile, Lekhi, a sitting MP from New Delhi, had defeated Congress' Ajay Maken by a margin of 1,62,708 votes in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections from the same constituency.
Delhi will go to polls on May 12 for the seven Lok Sabha seats at stake. The counting of votes will take place on May 23
Gambhir, who enjoys a solid army of admirers, isn’t the first Indian cricketer to join politics. The likes of Mohammad Azharuddin and Navjot Singh Sidhu have gone down that road too among others. The 36-year-old has been a part of two World Cup-winning Indian teams. He has played 58 Test matches and 147 ODIs for the country in a glittering career.
With ANI input
1. Other BJP leaders file nomination
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Union Minister Harsh Vardhan, Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari and sitting party MP Parvesh Verma filed their nomination on Monday for the Chandni Chowk, Northeast Delhi and West Delhi constituencies respectively.
They also organised road shows which saw participation of Union ministers Nitin Gadkari, Nirmala Sitharaman, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Vijay Goel.
The BJP had announced candidates for four seats in the national capital late on Sunday evening and had retained sitting MPs including Ramesh Bidhuri from South Delhi.
During the road show, Vardhan who filed his nomination for the Chandni Chowk constituency was accompanied by Gadkari and Naqvi while Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman joined the road show organised by Parvesh Verma who is the sitting BJP MP from West Delhi.
During his road show, which culminated at the office of Returning Officer, Northeast, Tiwari was accompanied by Goel.
Haryanvi singer-dancer Sapna Choudhary and rebel AAP MLA Kapil Mishra also accompanied Tiwari.
2. No alliance with AAP
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Ending months of speculation over a possible tie-up with AAP, the Congress on Monday fielded three-time Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit from North-East Delhi and former Union minister Ajay Maken from New Delhi, as it announced the names of candidates for six Lok Sabha seats in the national capital.
The Congress also fielded J P Agarwal from Chandni Chowk, Arvinder Singh Lovely from East Delhi, Rajesh Lilothia from North-West Delhi and Mahabal Mishra from West Delhi.
Eighty-one year old Dikshit, who took over from Maken as the Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee chief earlier this year, was last a Member of Parliament from 1984-89 from Kannauj. She was the chief minister of Delhi for three terms between 1998 and 2013.
She had contested from East Delhi constituency in 1998, but lost. Diskhit had not entered electoral fray since she lost to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal in 2013 Assembly polls.
Dikshit will take on BJP's sitting MP Manoj Tiwari and Aam Aadmi Party's (AAP) Dilip Pandey.
"We will begin campaigning soon by highlighting achievements of Congress governments in Delhi as well as at the Centre," Dikshit told reporters after her name was declared as a candidate from North East Delhi.
She also said her party was prepared to face the challenge of a triangular contest in Delhi.
3. Sibal not named
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Interestingly, senior Congress leader Kapil Sibal has not been named from the Chandni Chowk seat from which he has been fighting since 2004. After two terms, Sibal had lost to Union minister Harsh Vardhan in 2014.
Sibal had said last month that he will "certainly contest" from Delhi's Chandni Chowk seat in the Lok Sabha, irrespective of whether there is an alliance between his party and AAP.
The party has fielded Agarwal, a five-time MP, from Chandni Chowk who will take on Vardhan of the BJP and Pankaj Gupta of the AAP.
Another interesting pick by the Congress is former DCC chief Lovely from East Delhi where he will take on AAP's Atishi. The BJP is yet to declare its candidate from the seat.
Lovely has held important portfolios such as a minister in Delhi. He had briefly joined the BJP, but returned to the Congress fold in 2018. This will be Lovely's first parliamentary polls contest.
The Congress is yet to announce its candidate for the South Delhi seat.
In the 2014 national election, the BJP won all seven seats in Delhi.
Talks for an alliance between the Congress and AAP broke down over AAP's insistence that the grand old party should agree to share seats in Haryana, Chandigarh and Punjab apart from Delhi.
The AAP has already named its seven candidates in the national capital and six of its candidates filed their nominations on Monday for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls in Delhi.
The six candidates who filed their papers are Chandni Chowk candidate Pankaj Gupta, East Delhi candidate Atishi, North West Delhi candidate Gugan Singh, South Delhi candidate Raghav Chadha, North East Delhi candidate Dilip Pandey and New Delhi candidate Brijesh Goyal.
