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As many as 41 candidates have won the Rajya Sabha election seats unopposed, including veteran Congress leader P Chidambaram, former Congress leader Kapil Sibal, and Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD)’s Jayant Chaudhary, etc.
Elections were scheduled to be held on June 10 to fill 57 Rajya Sabha seats from 15 states that will be falling vacant due to the retirement of members on different dates between June and August. Friday was the last date for the withdrawal of candidature.
On June 10, elections will now be held for six seats in Maharashtra, four each in Rajasthan and Karnataka, and two in Haryana. Results will be declared the same day.
Of the 41 elected candidates, 11 candidates are from Uttar Pradesh, six from Tamil Nadu, five from Bihar, four from Andhra Pradesh, three from Madhya Pradesh, and Odisha, tow each from Chattisgarh, Punjab, Telangana and Jharkhand, and one from Uttarkhand, respectively.
In Uttar Pradesh, eight members of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have become Rajya Sabha's MP. The eight BJP members, who have been elected, are Laxmikant Bajpai, Dr Radha Mohan Das Agarwal, Surendra Nagar, Dr K Laxman, and Mithilesh Kumar, Baburam Nishad, Sangeeta Yadav and Darshana Singh.
Former Congress party leader Kapil Sibal has been elected as an independent candidate and Rashtriya Lok Dal president Jayant Chaudhary has also been declared elected. Both have been elected with Samajwadi Party support. Javed Ali of the Samajwadi Party has also been elected.
In Bihar, Misa Bharati daughter of RJD Chief Lalu Prasad elected unopposed in the biennial election of Rajya Sabha. The other four candidates are Faiyaz Ahmad (RJD), Khiru Mahto (Janta Dal-United), Satish Chandra Dubey and Shambhu Sharan Patel (BJP).
From Jharkhand, Aditya Sahu from BJP and Dr. Mahua Majhi from Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) has been elected unopposed to the Upper House of the Parliament.
The winners from Tamil Nadu are the ruling DMK's S Kalyanasundaram, R Girirajan and KRN Rajesh Kumar, AIADMK's C Ve Shanmugam and R Dharmar and Congress's Chidambaram.
In the Upper House, the DMK's current strength of 10 would continue to be unaltered and AIADMK representation is set to slide to 4 MPs from 5 members. With Chidambaram's election, the Congress party would have a member from Tamil Nadu in the Rajya Sabha after a long gap. In 2016, Chidambaram was elected to the Rajya Sabha from Maharashtra and his term ends on July 4.
V Vijayasai Reddy, Beeda Masthan Rao, R Krishnaiah, and S Niranjan Reddy of the ruling YSR Congress were also elected unopposed from Andhra Pradesh. With this win, the strength of the YSRC has now increased to nine in Rajya Sabha, out of 11 from the state, with the TDP and the BJP having one member each.
AAP candidates -- noted environmentalist Balbir Singh Seechewal and entrepreneur-social activist Vikramjit Singh Sahney -- were declared winners in Punjab.
Meanwhile, Shiv Sena has decided to call its MLAs to Mumbai and lodge them in a hotel to avoid any chances of poaching before the Rajya Sabha polls. Seven candidates are in the fray for six Upper House seats from Maharashtra that will go to the polls.
From Maharashtra, the BJP has fielded three candidates —- Union minister Piyush Goyal, Anil Bonde, and Dhananjay Mahadik. The NCP has renominated Praful Patel. The Sena has fielded Sanjay Raut and Sanjay Pawar. Congress has given candidature to Imran Pratapgarhi.
Six candidates are in the fray for the polls for four seats from Karnataka. Despite not having an adequate number of votes to win the fourth seat, BJP, Congress and JD(S) have fielded candidates for the seat, forcing an election.
Meanwhile, keen contests for the four seats in Rajasthan and two in Haryana are on the cards as none of the candidates withdrew their candidatures on the last day.
The Congress is expecting three seats in Rajasthan and the BJP is one of its own and is supporting an independent and media baron Subhash Chandra for the fourth seat.
In Haryana, Congress has fielded Ajay Maken for one seat and the BJP has fielded one candidate and is supporting another independent candidate and media baron Kartikeya Sharma for the second seat.