From Our Bureau
NEW DELHI: The Election Commission on Monday announced the biennial elections on March 31 to fill up 13 seats in the Rajya Sabha that are falling vacant in April on account of retirement, including five from Punjab.
The seats falling vacant include that of Congress leaders A K Antony and Anand Sharma from Kerala and Himachal Pradesh respectively.
Out of the five seats to be filled from Punjab, three are to be held by holding one election since they fall in two different biennial cycles. They are against the retirement of Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa of Akali Dal, Partap Singh Bajwa of Congress and Shwait Malik of BJP. Two others are against the retirement of Akali Dal’s Naresh Gujral and Shamsher Singh Dullo of Congress.
The EC notification says elections from Punjab shall be subjecgt to the decision of the Supreme Court in the 2015 petition of Devesh Chandra Thakur and others.
Besides Antony, the two other seats falling vacant in Kerala are those of M V Shreyams Kumar (LJD) and Somaprasad K (CPI-M). Two seats falling vacant in Assam are those of Congress members Ripun Bora and Narah Ranee. Other vacancies to be filled up are those of Jharna Das Baidya (CPI-M) from Tripura and K G Kenye (NPF) from Nagaland.
Nominations for all these seats will open on March 14 and close on March 21 while the last date for withdrawal is March 24 and polling on March 31 from 9 AM to 4 PM.
