Three BJP candidates win in Rajya Sabha

Bhopal, Mar 28: Three Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) nominees Maya Singh, Prabhat Jha and Raghunandan Sharma were on Friday declared elected to the Rajya Sabha in biennial elections to fill up three seats, from Madhya Pradesh, falling vacant next month.

Congress-supported independent candidate Vivek Krishna Tankha was drubbed in the elections, marred by cross-voting by legislators belonging to minor political parties sinking respective party ideology in favour of the ruling BJP, which was short of eight votes to ensure its third candidate got through. The BJP bagged all three seats against the retiring members- one of BJP and two of Congress. The results were declared in evening by Principal Secretary (Assembly) AK Payasi who was the Returning Officer.

BJP National Vice-President Maya Singh was re-elected while National Secretary Prabhat Jha and former state spokesman Raghunandan Sharma, who returned to the BJP recently after a brief stint in the Uma Bharti-led Bharatiya Jan Shakti (BJS), were elected to the Upper House. Other outgoing members- Union Minister Suresh Pachauri and Mohd Obaidullah Azmi belonged to Congress. The polling took place in the backdrop of Samajwadi Party MLA Kishore Samrite alleging that the Congress attempted to bribe him to vote in Tankha's favour.

The BJP candidates received votes from small political parties too. They included- all three votes from Gondwana Gantantra Party (GGP), one from Samajwadi Party (Vijay Bahadur Singh), Janata Dal (U) having one, Rashtriya Samanata Dal (RSD) two and one independent (Munna Singh Narwaria. Thus, the BJP candidates succeeded in receiving additional votes of eight legislators. On the other hand, independent candidate received 41 votes of Congress, seven from Samajwadi Party, one CPM, one NCP and one from independent. The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) legislators kept them aloof from election process.