BJP and Congress name nominees for Rajya Sabha polls

NEWDELHI: The Bharatiya Janata Party announced on Thursday five candidates for the Rajya Sabha elections from Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Maharashtra. The Shiv Sena picked Priyanka Chaturvedi as a nominee from Maharashtra. The Congress named several heavyweights, including ex-mp CM Digvijaya Singh, for the March 26 polls.

NEWDELHI: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Thursday announced the names of five candidates for the Rajya Sabha polls from Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Maharashtra and a candidate for the bypoll for the Maharashtra legislative council.

From Haryana, the party has nominated Ramchandra Jhangra and Dushyant Kumar Gautam, while Indu Goswami is the party’s choice from Himachal Pardesh, Bhagwat Karad from Maharashtra and Sumer Singh Solanki from Madhya Pradesh. A day earlier it had nominated Jyotiraditya Scindia from Madhya Pradesh and there was speculation that Harsh Chouhan, a member of the Vanvasi Kalyan Ashram, would be the second candidate.

Amrish Bhai Rasiklal Patel was announced as the candidate for the by-election to the Maharashtra Legislative Council.

Solanki is an RSS worker and resident of Barwani district who has worked among tribals in Malwa region; he is a senior assistant professor in the history department at a government college in Barwani.

Goswami was a former Akhil Bharatiya Janata Party activist and appointed general secretary of the BJP Mahila Morcha in 1992. She was the state secretary of the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha from 1994-96 and worked with Prime Minister Narendra Modi as the BJP Yuva Morcha vicepresident.

Jhangra is a backward community leader, who was earlier associated with Haryana Vikas Party (HVP) led by former chief minister Bansi Lal. However, when the HVP merged with the Congress, he joined the BJP. Gautam is a party vice-president.

Fifty-five Rajya Sabha seats will go to polls on March 26 and the last date of filing nominations is March 13.