Maya enters RS as Roy, Jaitley stay

In an election on which a cloud of money bags and coalition politics cast their shadow, 48 candidates including newly appointed Union Minister Mukul Roy,  BSP chief Mayawati and senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley got elected unopposed to the Rajya Sabha on Thursday.

Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairman K Rahman Khan of the Congress, Basavaraj Patil Sedam and R Ramakrishna of the BJP and Independent candidate Rajeev Chandrasekhar were elected unopposed from Karnataka, in the biennial elections. Of the 48 seats, the Congress won 12 seats and the BJP 10. A total of 58 seats will fall vacant next month.

Union ministers Vilasrao Deshmukh and Rajiv Shukla of the Congress, besides NCP’s D P Tripathi are among six winners from Maharashtra. Besides Mayawati, BJP’s Vinay Katiyar, Rashid Masood of the Congress and film actor Jaya Bachchan were prominent winners from Uttar Pradesh. Jaitley was elected from Gujarat.

Railway Minister Mukul Roy is one of the four winning candidates of the Trinamool Congress (TMC) from West Bengal. Apart from Roy, who returns to the House, three journalists Kunal Ghosh, Mohammed Nadim-ul-Haq and Vivek Gupta have been elected from the  TMC.

Four candidates, including two from the ruling BJP and one from the Opposition Congress (Rahman Khan) were declared elected unopposed to the Rajya Sabha from Karnataka. Basavaraj Patil Sedam and R Ramakrishna of the BJP will be new in the Rajya Sabha. Rajeev Chandrashekar is a sitting member.

Chranjeevi wins

From Andhra Pradesh, Telugu film star K Chiranjeevi and Congress party spokesperson Renuka Chowdary were among the six candidates to get elected.
All the five nominees from Madhya Pradesh including BJP’s cash-for-vote accused Faggan Singh Kulaste, former RS vice-chairman and BJP nominee Najma Heptullah and Congress's Satyavrat Chaturvedi got elected.