All the eight candidates of the ruling Samajwadi Party filed their nominations for the biennial election for 12 seats of the state legislative council, which would go to polls on January 23 if more than 12 candidates would file their nominations. The candidates who filed nomination on Monday included leader of the Council and Health Minister Ahmed Hasan, Ramesh Yadav of Etah, Sarojni Agarwal of Meerut (all three re-nominated), Ramjatan Rajbhar of Azamgarh, Saheb Singh Saini of Saharanpur, Ashok Bajpai of Hardoi, Virendra Singh Gujjar of Shamli and Ashu Mallick.
All the candidates filed their nominations in two sets before Returning Officer and Principal Secretary (Assembly) Pradeep Kumar Dubey at the central hall of the Vidhan Bhawan.
Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav along with several ministers and Samajwadi Party leaders were present during the filing of the nominations.
Tuesday is the last date for filing of the nominations while the nominations would be scrutinised on Wednesday and candidates can withdraw their papers till January 16 (Friday). If required the polling would be held on January 23. Three BSP candidates had filed their nominations last week while BJP candidate laxman Acharya would file his papers on Tuesday, the last day. BSP had fielded leader of the Opposition in the Council Naseemudin Siddique, Dharamveer Singh Ashok and Pradeep.
If no other candidate was announced by any other party, all would be elected unopposed. If one more candidate is announced either by BJP or Congress, elections would happen. As the state assembly has 403 members, first preference votes of 31 MlAs would be needed to ensurevictory of a candida te to the Upper House in January 23 election to 12 seats. SP with 230 MlAs can secure only seven Council seats. But with Congress, which had 28 MlAs, so far deciding not to field a candidate as quid pro quo for SP’s support in Rajya Sabha election, SP can now win the eighth seat as well.
BSP with 80 MlAs will easily manage two seats, but with a surplus of 18 votes, it would require support of 13 MlAs from outside to ensure victory of its third candidate. BSP is now reportedly having support of Rastriya lok Dal (RlD) which had 8 MlAs. BJP, on the other hand, has 41 MlAs and can secure victory of only one out of two candidates unless it too gets outside support. Smaller parties like Peace Party (4 MlAs), Quami Ekta Dal (2), and NCP, Etehad-e-Millat Council and Trinmool Congress (with one MlA each) besides six Independents could play a crucial role in deciding the 12th winning candidate in case of voting. Among the 12 retiring members whose term will come to an end on January 30, seven are from BSP, three from SP and two from BJP.