Bhopal, April 4 (IANS): BJP's Madhya Pradesh unit President V.D. Sharma on Wednesday filed his nomination papers from the Khajuraho Lok Sabha constituency.

Accompanied by Union Minister Smriti Irani, MP cabinet minister Prahlad Singh Patel and BJP MLA Sanjay Pathak, Sharma, 53, filed his nomination papers for his second contest.

He won his debut Lok Sabha election from Khajuraho in 2019 with a margin of over five lakh votes against Congress' Kavita Singh.

Beginning his political career from the RSS student wing Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), Sharma became the state unit President in 2020 after the BJP lost the 2018 Assembly elections.

The Khajuraho seat, comprising eight assembly segments - Chandla (SC), Rajnagar, Pawai, Gunnaor (SC), Panna, Vijayraghavgarh, Murwara, Bahoriband - spanning three districts of Chhatarpur, Panna, and Katni of Bundelkhand region, was once a Congress stronghold.

Congress veteran Vidyavati Chaturvedi was elected as MP from Khajuraho twice (1980 and 1984), while his son and ex-Rajya Sabha MP Satyavrata Chaturvedi was the last Congress MP from this seat in 1999.

BJP leader and former MP CM Uma Bharti also represented Khajuraho Lok Sabha seat four times from 1989 to 1998, and her party has been unbeaten in Khajuraho since 2004.

The Congress has, this time, left the Khajuraho seat for INDIA bloc partner, Samajwadi Party. The SP initially had fielded Manoj Yadav but later replaced him with Meera Deepak.