Eight Bharatiya Janata Party candidates filed their nominations for Rajya Sabha elections in the presence of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath in Lucknow on Tuesday.
A total of eight BJP candidates, including BJP’s OBC Morcha national president K Laxman, former state BJP chief Laxmikant Vajpayee, former Lok Sabha MP Mithilesh Kumar, ex-MLA Radha Mohan Das Aggarwal, sitting Rajya Sabha MP Surendra Singh Nagar, Baburam Nishad, Darshana Singh and ex-MLA Sangeeta Yadav, filed their papers.
Apart from the Chief Minister, two Deputy Chief Ministers Brajesh Pathak and Keshav Prasad Maurya were among senior party leaders present on the occasion. Elections to 57 Rajya Sabha seats spread across 15 states will take place on June 10 and the maximum number of seats are in Uttar Pradesh, with polls to be held for 11 vacancies. Three candidates, one from Samajwadi Party and two candidates backed by it including Independent Kapil Sibal and Rashtriya Lok Dal chief Jayant Chaudhary had earlier filed their papers.
The notification for the biennial election was issued by Election Commission of India on May 24, 2022, while the last date for filing nominations is May 31, 2022, the last date for withdrawal of candidature is June 3. With 273 MLAs in the Assembly, the ruling BJP-led NDA will easily be able to get eight members elected to the Upper House of Parliament. On the other hand, Samajwadi Party and its allies, with a strength of 125 legislators, will be able to ensure the victory of three candidates.
Among the 11 retiring MPs from the state, five are from the BJP, three from SP, two from BSP and one from Congress. The five retiring MPs of the BJP are Zafar Islam, Shiv Pratap Shukla, Sanjay Seth, Surendra Nagar and Jai Prakash Nishad. The SP leaders completing their terms include former UP Legislative Council Chairman Sukhram Singh Yadav, Reoti Raman Singh and Vishambhar Prasad Nishad. The BSP MPs whose term is coming to an end are Satish Chandra Misra and Ashok Siddharth. The term of Kapil Sibal of Congress is also ending in July. Only Surendra Singh Nagar and Kapil Sibal filed their papers for another term this time.