This has dashed hopes of BJP MP Avinash Rai Khanna to contest from Anandpur Sahib. The Hoshiarpur seat, from where Khanna is the standing MP, is also not open for him as it has been reserved after delimitation.

Of the 13 seats the alliance will contest for, the Akali Dal has finalised four new faces so far. Candidature of sufi singer Hans Raj Hans from Jalandhar and Dr D S Cheema from Anandpur Sahib has been announced, while Sukhbir Singh Badal’s wife Harsimrat Kaur is expected to contest from Bathinda.

Sher Singh, SAD MLA from Jalalabad (Ferozepur), however, is also being considered. The BJP has retained sitting MPs Navjot Singh Sidhu and Vinod Khanna from Amritsar and Gurdaspur, respectively.

The party will also announce a new

candidate for the third seat it has to contest, be it from Hoshiarpur, Ludhiana or even Ferozepur. The SAD had earlier announced the candidature of Prem Singh Chandumajra, Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa and Paramjit Kaur Gulshan.

Dr Cheema, who is secretary of the SAD, has also been the party’s spokesperson since January last year. A doctor, Cheema has served the SAD in various capacities in the past 15 years. He was also Director, Punjab Small-Scale Industry and Export Corporation, in 1998.

SAD president Sukhbir Badal lauded the tireless services rendered by Dr Cheema in strengthening the party set-up at the grassroots level.