KOLHAPUR: Fifty BJP candidates are ‘imports’ from other major political parties, with the Congress and NCP accounting for a generous contribution of 35. The BJP hopes that many of them with considerable local clout will improve its vote share in constituencies where it does not have a toehold.The BJP had reached out to potential rebels in each major party, or those who were denied tickets but confident of winning on their own. Fresh from its split with the Shiv Sena , it made them an offer that they just could not refuse.The candidates took up the offers hoping that anti-incumbency and the Modi wave will work in their favour.Social media has been flooded with a list of the candidates. The Sena and NCP have objected to the BJP’s poaching and said it was finding it difficult to contest on its own and hence ‘ imported ’ candidates. MNS chief Raj Thackeray has been reading out the list at meetings since Sunday.The BJP brass admitted it accepted a ‘few’ candidates from other parties and that the decision was taken for areas where it had suffered in earlier polls. Party leaders said they wanted winning candidates where it had a weak base.“It’s purely a political decision. There are 72 seats where the BJP and Sena have lost many times since their alliance. Of these, 53 were Sena’s seats and 19 were ours. Once the alliance was snapped, we decided to allow capable candidates to contest from these parties,” senior BJP leader Vinod Tawade told TOI.Tawde said the BJP had given tickets to 22 leaders who had recently joined it.“Those leaders have a strong local connect, and ultimately the BJP will be strengthened there. If other parties are criticising us, they should tell people that the BJP has its own party loyalists in over 200 constituencies,” he said.Laxman Jagtap (NCP) and Amal Mahadik (Congress) switched to the BJP a day after the split with the Sena, which indicates that the BJP was candidate hunting until the last minute.Political observers said the BJP had taken a calculated risk in importing candidates. “Most of them are influential local leaders. The BJP hopes to benefit from their influence. For instance, in Western Maharashtra , the party’s influence is less compared to the NCP and Congress. The BJP imported candidates from these two parties mostly in this region. Some are capable enough to win as independents,” said Ashok Chousalkar, a political analyst.