Odisha's ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD) on announced the names of nine candidates to contest the upcoming Lok Sabha polls on Wednesday, following the BJP's decision to contest the parliamentary and Assembly polls in the state alone.

Odisha will go to the polls in four phases on May 1, 20, 25 and June 1. The state Assembly polls will coincide with the Lok Sabha elections.

The nine candidates are Pranab Prakash Das (Sambalpur), Lambodhar Nial (Kalahandi), Manmath Routray (Bhubaneswar), Anshuman Mohanty (Kendrapara), Paradip Majhi (Nabarangpur), Dilip Tirkey (Sundargarh), Sudam Marandi (Mayurbhanj) Ranjita Sahu (Aska) and Kaushalya Hikaka (Koraput).

On March 22, the chief of the BJP's Odisha unit Manmohan Samal said the party would "contest and win all the 21 seats of the Lok Sabha and all the 147 seats of the Legislative Assembly" in Odisha.

The state BJP chief also claimed that several welfare schemes of the Narendra Modi-led Central government were not reaching the ground in Odisha.