
The Congress party has named four candidates for the Rajya Sabha elections. Former Congress president Sonia Gandhi is scheduled to represent Rajasthan, Akhilesh Prasad will contest from Bihar, Abhishek Manu Singhvi will contest from Himachal Pradesh and Chandrakant Handore will stand from Maharashtra.
Gandhi, who represented Rae Bareli in Lok Sabha, will not contest the next general elections this year. She has been a five-term Lok Sabha MP and was first elected in 1999 after taking over as the Congress president. Gandhi had announced in 2019 that it would be her last Lok Sabha election.
On Tuesday, it was reported that Gandhi will file her papers from Jaipur on February 14 and will accompanied by party chief Mallikarjun Kharge, Rahul Gandhi and daughter Priyanka Gandhi Vadra.
On Sunday, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) released its list of Rajya Sabha candidates for 14 seats, which include former Congress minister RPN Singh and six others for Uttar Pradesh, and a mix of leaders from other states, aimed at balancing caste equations and boosting organisational morale and strength.
A total of 56 members of Rajya Sabha from 15 states are retiring in April and the election to the seats will be held on February 27. The last date for filing nominations is February 15.
The Congress is comfortably placed to win one of the three Rajya Sabha seats from Rajasthan for which elections will be held. The seat will fall vacant after former prime minister Manmohan Singh completes his six-year tenure in April.
Congress was facing some hurdles after former Maharashtra CM Ashok Chavan resigned from the Congress on Monday. Six of the Rajya Sabha seats in Maharashtra will become vacant in April.
Currently, the Congress party holds only one seat, which is occupied by Kumar Ketkar. BJP holds three seats, while the Shiv Sena and Nationalist Congress Party, led by Uddhav Thackeray and Sharad Pawar respectively, hold one seat each. In order to elect a representative to the Rajya Sabha, a party in Maharashtra requires the support of 41 MLAs.