With the Election Commission of India (ECI) announcing to issue notification on May 25 for holding elections to the 57 Rajya Sabha seats in 14 States, including three from Odisha that will fall vacant at the end of the tenure of Pyarimohan Mahapatra, Baishnab Parida and Bhupinder Singh on July 1, the race among the hopefuls in the ruling BJD is hotting up.
Though there are many aspirants in the BJD, which enjoys the required majority in the State Assembly to elect all the three of its candidates but all eyes are on party supremo and Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, who would take a final call in selection of the candidates. The BJD has 117 members in the 147-seat Assembly.
Meanwhile, sources said intense lobbying has begun for the RS seats.
The ECI would hold elections on June 11.
Besides Odisha, this biennial exercise would be held in Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Punjab, Jharkhand, Haryana and Uttarakhand.
The notification for the elections would be issued on May 25 while June 1 is the last date for filing of nominations; scrutiny of nominations would be on June 2and withdrawal of nominations on June 4.
Polling would be held on June 11 from 9 am to 4 pm while counting and the declaration of results would be done the same day at 5 pm.