New Delhi, Oct. 5 -- The BJP on Monday announced the names of eight candidates, including minister Dharam Pal Singh, for the upcoming Rajya Sabha elections in Uttar Pradesh. The other seven candidates are Radhakant Ojha, Prakash Pal, Vidyasagar Sonkar, Gopi Krishna Pandey, Priyanka Singh Rawat, Ram Pratap Singh Chauhan and Shruti Gangwar, a BJP statement said.
The names of these eight candidates have been approved by the BJP central election committee, it said. Elections to 12 Rajya Sabha seats across Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and West Bengal will be held on October 16. These include 10 seats from Uttar Pradesh and one from Uttarakhand, along with a bypoll to one seat from West Bengal. The terms of the sitting members from Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand end on November 25. Among the Rajya Sabha members retiring from Uttar Pradesh are BJP leaders Arun Singh, Geeta Shakya, Neeraj Shekhar, Brijlal, B L Verma, Seema Dwivedi and Hardeep Singh Puri, Samajwadi Party leader Ram Gopal Yadav and BSP's Ramji Gautam.
The Rajya Sabha seat held by former Uttar Pradesh deputy chief minister Dinesh Sharma has also been vacant since September 11, when his resignation took effect following his appointment as lieutenant governor of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.