Rajya Sabha polls: Ram Jethmalani, Misa Bharti to contest on RJD tickets

Patna: Former BJP MP Ram Jethmalani on Monday filed his Rajya Sabha nomination from Bihar, on an RJD ticket. 

Jethmalani was the law minister in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government, and, of late, has been critical of the Narendra Modi government. He was dismissed from the BJP in November 2012.

JD(U) leader Sharad Yadav, along with RJD chief Lalu Prasad’s daughter Misa Bharti have also filed their nomination papers as candidates of the ruling ‘grand alliance’ in Bihar.

The Grand Alliance’s five nominees also filed their papers for Biennial elections are being held to fill five Rajya Sabha and seven Legislative Council seats.

Grand Alliance candidates Gulam Rasool Baliyavi, CP Sinha (JD-U), SM Qamar Alam, Ranvijay Singh (RJD) and Tanveer Akhtar (Congress) filed papers for Council polls.

Candidates submitted their nomination papers before Bihar Assembly Secretary-cum-Returning Officer Ram Shrestha Rai. Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, RJD chief Lalu Prasad, former chief minister Rabri Devi, Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Prasad Yadav, JD(U) state chief Bashishtha Narayan Singh, Bihar Congress chief Ashok Choudhary were present while their nominations were filed.

“All the candidates of alliance will definitely win,” Lalu Prasad said, confidently, adding that the party’s third candidate, will be announced later in the day. May 31 is the last day for filing nominations for these seats, while the scrutiny will take place on June 1.

The last date for withdrawal of candidature is June 3. BJP nominee Gopal Narayan Singh for Rajya Sabha and Arjun Sahni for Legislative Council are likely to file their nomination papers on Tuesday.

Bihar BJP chief Mangal Pandey on Sunday had announced that the party will field its second candidate for Legislative Council polls. If both RJD and BJP field a third and second candidate respectively, as they have announced, for the seven-seat Council polls, then the contest will become inevitable for the upper house of the state.

Polling, if necessary, will be held for seven Council seats on June 10 from 9 am to 4 pm. Polling for Rajya Sabha election, if necessary, will be held on June 11 and counting of votes will be at 5 pm on the same day.

All five Rajya Sabha MPs from Bihar – K C Tyagi, Pavan Kumar Varma, Gulam Rasool, Ramchandra Prasad Singh and Sharad Yadav – are from JD(U) and are set to retire in July.

Members of the Legislative Council who will retire on July 21, 2016 are Uday Kant Choudhary, Kiran Ghai Sinha, Rudal Rai, Vijay Kumar Verma and Harendra Pratap Pandey while two seats fell vacant due to resignation of Bhola Yadav and Manzar Alam.