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Jammu, Oct 12 (IANS) The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Sunday announced its list of three candidates for the vacant Rajya Sabha seats from Jammu and Kashmir, elections for which will be held on October 24.
With the announcement, the BJP will contest three of the four Rajya Sabha seats from the Union Territory.
The party has decided to field its UT president Satpal Sharma and leaders Rakesh Mahajan and Ghulam Mohammad Mir.
Out of four Rajya Sabha seats, BJP has lead on the fourth seat, for which the party has fielded Sat Sharma.
According to the Electoral College vote division, BJP has 28 votes for the fourth Rajya Sabha seat while the National Conference (NC) alliance has 24 votes.
The National Conference has already announced its three candidates for the three Rajya Sabha seats in which it has an edge over the BJP.
NC general secretary Ali Mohammad Sagar and adviser to the chief minister Nasir Aslam Wani told reporters that the party has decided to field Chaudhary Mohammad Ramzan, Sajjad Kitchlu and Shammi Oberoi for the seats.
The ruling party in the union territory has offered Congress a fourth seat to contest the elections. Since the BJP has a clear lead over the NC-Congress alliance on the fourth seat, the Congress has refused to field its candidate on this ‘risky’ seat.
Sources said talks are underway with the NC leadership to convince the Congress to give it a ‘safe’ seat. There is little possibility that the National Conference will give up any of the three seats for which the party has already announced its candidates.
This has resulted in a deadlock over Rajya Sabha seat sharing between NC and Congress.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) announced elections for four Rajya Sabha seats in Jammu and Kashmir on September 24 after more than four years, as the UT did not have a legislative assembly after February 2021.
“All the above four seats are lying vacant since the expiry of the tenure of the existing members due to non-availability of voters required to hold the said elections at the time of occurrence of the said vacancies. Consequent to the constitution of the State Legislative Assembly of the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, there is a need for voters to hold biennial elections to the Council of States from the Union Territory,” the ECI said in its statement. Jammu and Kashmir.”
The last date for filing nomination papers for four Rajya Sabha seats is Monday. Voting will take place on 24 October.
–IANS
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