Congress appoints observers for Rajya Sabha polls in 3 states
India Today
The Congress on Sunday appointed observers for Rajya Sabha polls in Haryana, Maharashtra and Rajasthan.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Sunday appointed senior party leaders as observers in three states ahead of the Rajya Sabha elections on June 10. Mallikarjun Kharge has been made the observer for Maharashtra, Bhupesh Baghel and Rajeev Shukla have been made observers for Haryana, and Pawan Kumar Bansal and T S Singh Deo for Rajasthan.
The Congress is hoping to win the Rajya Sabha (RS) elections in Haryana, Rajasthan and Maharashtra, while the BJP is supporting independent candidates in Haryana and Rajasthan.
The general secretary of the All India Congress Committee (AICC), Ajay Maken is the Congress candidate from Haryana. The Congress and the BJP will likely get one seat each, but the BJP has backed independent candidate Kartikeya Sharma.
Sharma is the son of Venod Sharma and son-in-law of former Haryana Speaker Kuldeep Sharma.
The Congress needs 31 votes to win the seat and has as many MLAs. The BJP is banking on cross-voting.
For the four Rajya Sabha seats in Rajasthan, the Congress has fielded three candidates - Randeep Surjewala, Mukul Wasnik and Pramod Tiwari. The BJP has fielded its former minister Ghanshyam Tiwari, and backed Subhash Chandra as an independent for the second seat.
Of the 57 vacant seats in Rajya Sabha, 41 candidates in 11 states have so far been elected unopposed. The elections will be held for 16 seats in four states of Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Haryana and Karnataka.
