BJP announces candidates for upcoming Rajya Sabha Biennial Elections

NEW DELHI, (ANI): The Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday announced candidates for the upcoming Rajya Sabha Biennial Elections to be held in various states. The BJP has fielded Dharmsheela Gupta and Bhim Singh from Bihar and Raja Devendra Pratap Singh from Chhattisgarh.

Subhash Barala will contest from Haryana, Narayana Krishanasa Bhandage from Karnataka, Mahendra Bhatt from Uttarakhand and Samik Bhattacharya from West Bengal. RPN Singh, Sudhanshu Trivedi, Chaudhary Tejveer Singh, Sadhna Singh, Amarpal Maurya, Sangita Balwant and Navin Jain will fight from Uttar Pradesh.

Meanwhile, a total of 58 Rajya Sabha members–including eight Central Ministers, former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national President JP Nadda–will retire by the first week of May this year. Mansukh Mandaviya, Bhupender Yadav, Parshottam Rupala, Dharmendra Pradhan, V Murleedharan, Narayan Rane, Rajeev Chandrashekhar and Ashwini Vaishnaw are the eight ministers who will retire by April 2-3, along with 47 other MPs, including Manmohan Singh and Nadda.

Among those retiring are 28 MPs from the BJP, 11 from Congress, four from Trinamool Congress, four from Bharat Rashtra Samithi, two each from Biju Janata Dal, Rashtriya Janata Dal and Janata Dal (United), and one each from YSRCP, Shiv Sena, NCP, Telugu Desam Party, and Sikkim Democratic Front. Samajwadi Party’s Jaya Bachchan, BJP’s Anil Baluni and Prakash Javadekar, and BJD’s Amar Patnaik are among those leaders retiring from the Rajya Sabha.

The retirement of these MPs and the outcome of the upcoming general elections will impact the representation each party will have in the Upper House during the next Lok Sabha term. Presently, the BJP has 93 MPs in the Rajya Sabha, 30 MPs in Congress, 13 in the Trinamool Congress, and six nominated members, among others, in a house of 239 with six vacancies. (ANI)