With 14 candidates, from Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and other bigwigs to an independent, entering the fray for 10 vacant Rajya Sabha seats from Uttar Pradesh, a contest to the Parliament’s Upper House became imminent on Monday.
“As many as 11 BJP candidates and an independent filed their nomination papers today. This takes the total number of candidates in the fray to 14, with SP’s Jaya Bachchan and BSP’s Bhimrao Ambedkar having already filed nominations earlier,” returning officer Poonam Saxena said.
The BJP candidates who filed their nominations were: Union Finance Minister Jaitley, Ashok Bajpai, Vijay Pal Singh Tomar, Sakal Deep Rajbhar, Kanta Kardam, Anil Jain, Harnath Singh Yadav, GVL Narasimha Rao, Anil Kumar Agarwal, Salil Bishnoi and Vidyasagar Sonkar.
“An independent Mahesh Chandra Sharma also filed his nomination papers,” Saxena, special secretary, UP Assembly, said.
Monday was the last day for filing of nominations for the biennial elections.
Voting will be held on March 23 and the last date for withdrawal of candidature is March 15.
Last-minute drama
In Gujarat, for four seats, there are six candidates in the fray, three from the ruling BJP, which has repeated two outgoing members: Purushottam Rupala and Mansukh Mandavia, both Union Ministers, while former Gujarat Minister Kiritsinh Rana came as a third candidate.
The Opposition Congress has fielded two official candidates: former Union Minister Naran Rathwa and party spokesperson and lawyer Amee Yagnik while senior Congress leader P.K. Valera has filed his nomination as an independent candidate with the party’s backing.
The last day of filing nomination papers witnessed some drama as news came that Mr. Rathwa’s nomination was technically defective and a senior national leader Rajiv Shukla was being rushed to file the nomination. However, just 30 minutes before the deadline, Mr. Rathwa submitted his nomination papers and within minutes Mr. Valera joined the fray as an independent.
Three in the bag for BJP
Bharatiya Janata Party candidates Bhupendra Yadav, Kirori Lal Meena and Madan Lal Saini filed their nomination papers in Jaipur for the biennial Rajya Sabha elections from Rajasthan.
The victory of the three candidates is certain, as the Congress has not fielded any official candidate. The strength of members in the State Assembly, constituting the electoral college, is heavily tilted in favour of the ruling BJP.
The three BJP candidates submitted their nominations to Returning Officer Akhil Arora in the presence of Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje, BJP State president Ashok Parnami, several Cabinet Ministers and a large number of MLAs.
Senior BJP leaders Thawar Chand Gehlot, Dharmendra Pradhan, Ajay Pratap Singh and Kailash Soni along with Congress’s Rajmani Patel filed their nominations from Madhya Pradesh.
Six candidates filed papers for five Rajya Sabha seats from West Bengal in Kolkata. Four Trinamool candidates and one each from the Congress and the Left Front filed their nomination papers in the Assembly.
Accompanied by senior leaders and legislators of the party, four Trinamool candidates Md Nadimul Haque, Shanatnu Sen, Abir Ranjan Biswas and Subhasish Chakraborty filed their papers.
In Karnataka, L. Hanumanthaiah, Naseer Hussain, and G.C. Chandrashekar (all Congress). Rajeev Chandrsekhar (BJP), and B.M. Farooq (JD-S) filed their nomination papers for the Rajya Sabha polls.
(With PTI inputs)
