Rajya Sabha elections amid high drama, cross-voting and allegations

Vibha Sharma

Chandigarh, February 27

The high-pitched battle for 15 Rajya Sabha seats in Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, and Himachal Pradesh happened on Tuesday amid allegations of cross-voting by MLAs other than the parties they were elected from, and accusations of “unethical” practices  and “horse-trading” from all sides.

Whereas in UP, there was cross-over by some Samajwadi Party MLAs (later five SP MLAs also met CM Yogi Adityanath, according to reports) in Karanataka a BJP MLA is said to have cross-voted in favour of the ruling Congress.

In UP, the first indication of the unfolding situation came when Samajwadi Party MLA Manoj Kumar Pandey resigned from the post of party Chief Whip a day after he skipped a meeting called by party chief supremo Akhilesh Yadav to discuss the Rajya Sabha polling, a process quite different from the one followed for elections to the Lok Sabha. 

“Not everybody has the guts to stand against (BJP) government, pressure is put on everybody, is there anyone who does not know that BJP would go to any extent to win,” Yadav was quoted as saying in response, adding that action will be taken against such leaders.

“The BJP was dishonest during the Chandigarh elections also.When it comes to UP, BJP did everything to get votes and those who left, might not have had the guts to stand against the government. Action will be taken because our party leaders want such people to be kept away from the party,” he added.

In Karnataka, Congress had also moved its MLAs to a hotel to prevent any last-minute poaching and conducted a mock voting exercise on how to vote for first and second preferences.

BJP MLA ST Somashekar also voted for the Congress candidate, according to reports. 

Somashekar, who represents the Yeshwanthpur seat in Bengaluru, was quoted as saying that he has “voted for those who promised. My vote has gone to those who have given assurances to me.”

Meanwhile, the BJP is also contemplating stringent action against Somashekar

Elected unopposed

The 15 RS seats include 10 in Uttar Pradesh, four in Karnataka and one in Himachal Pradesh. Forty-one of 56 Rajya Sabha candidates have already been elected unopposed.

Former Congress president Sonia Gandhi, BJP chief J P Nadda and BJP leaders like Ashok Chavan, Ashwini Vaishnaw and L Murugan are among those elected unopposed to Rajya Sabha.

So far, the BJP has 20, followed by the Congress (6), Trinamool Congress (4), YSR Congress (3), RJD (2), BJD (2) and NCP, Shiv Sena, BRS and JD(U) one each.

Election to Rajya Sabha 

The Rajya Sabha term is for six years and elections are held after every two years for one-third of the members who retire.

Having a strength of 245 members, the Rajya Sabha, in those terms, is never completely dissolved unlike the Lok Sabha

Also unlike Lok Sabha, members of state legislative assemblies choose Rajya Sabha members through an indirect election system of proportional representation by means of a STV-the single transferable vote (STV) system.

The Rajya Sabha seats are allocated as per the population.

The voting power of each MLA is also determined by population in constituencies

While voting, MLAs rank preferences against each candidate, number one for top preference, which is the first preferential vote, number two for the next candidate and so on.

A candidate with the required number of first preference votes gets elected, otherwise votes are transferred to the next choice.

Apart from elected members representing States and Union Territories, 12 RS members are directly nominated by the President from the fields of art, literature, sports, science, etc.

Uttar Pradesh

For the 10 Rajya Sabha seats in the state, there were eight candidates from BJP and three from SP.

To be elected for Rajya Sabha, a candidate in UP needed around 37 first-preference votes.

As many as eight SP MLAs did not attend a meeting called by the Yadav on Monday to brief the MLAs about the voting process

Karnataka

Karnataka was a fight between Congress and BJP.

As many as 45 votes are required for a candidate to register a victory.

According to reports, of the four seats in the state, Congress and BJP are expected to win three seats and one seat, respectively.

Despite a BJP whip, Somashekar cross-voted in favour of the Congress candidate after speaking of ‘conscience vote’.