Veteran BJP leaders Meghraj Jain filed his nomination papers for Rajya Sabha here on Thursday.
Before filing nominations, Jain along with party workers reached the State BJP office and garlanded the busts of Pt Deen Dayal Upadhyay, Kushabhau Thakre and Rajmata Scindia.
While filing nominations in the State Assembly, Jain was accompanied by Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, State BJP president Nandkumar Singh Chouhan, State organizational general secretary Arvind Menon, Cabinet Ministers Gaurishankar Shejwar, Umashankar Gupta and Narottam Mishra, besides MP Alok Sanjar, MlAs Vishwas Sarang and Surendra Nath Singh.
As per the schedule, the notification for the bypoll was issued on September 4 and the last date for the filing of nomination papers was September 11. The scrutiny will be done on September 12 and the last date of withdrawal is September 15. If necessary, polling will be held on September 22 and the process of by-poll will be completed by September 26.
Jain has earlier served as a Rajya Sabha MP immediately after the death of former chief minister and union minister Arjun Singh. Jain is considered as close to Shivraj Singh Chouhan.
The seat fell vacant with the resignation of Kaptan Singh Solanki who was appointed governor of Haryana. Meghraj Jain will serve the remainder of Kaptan Singh’s term which ends on April 2, 2018. A swayamsewak, Jain has served in various capacities in the BJP and as secretary in-charge of the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM) during which he developed a close working relationship with the chief minister.
Jain was appointed chairman of the newly-created cow protection board under the MP government. He was also appointed as the chairman of the MP Mela authority, another body set up by the state government.