New Delhi, Sep 11 (IANS): The Congress has announced the names of 15 candidates for the bypolls to the 27 vacant Madhya Pradesh Assembly seats.

Among the candidates is Sunil Sharma who will be fielded from Gwalior, a bastion of Jyotiraditya Scindia, and former MP Premchand Guddu from Sanwer. Suresh Raje has been given the ticket from Dabra seat to take on Imarti Devi, a state Minister and Scindia loyalist.

As many as 22 MLAs from the Congress resigned along with Scindia and joined the BJP, which led to the fall of the Kamal Nath-led Congress government in March.

The Congress has a tough task ahead to win all the seats. In the 2018 elections, the Congress won in the Gwalior-Chambal area but the situation has since changed after Scindia and his supporting MLAs left the party.

In March, 22 MLAs defected from the Congress, with the numbers finally reaching 25. At present, in the 230-member Assembly, the Congress has 89 MLAs and the BJP 107 MLAs. The ruling party needs 9 more seats to reach the halfway mark.

But the Congress has to win all 27 seats, which go to the bypolls, to reach the 116-mark, and at least 25 to remain in the game because there are four Independent MLAs, 2 BSP MLAs, and one Samajwadi Party MLA who can tilt the numbers balance.