Sanjeev Pargal
JAMMU, Jan 12: In the wake of a Supreme Court direction that the MLAs can vote even without taking oath including when the Legislative Assembly is under suspended animation, the Election Commission of India today announced election for four seats of Rajya Sabha in Jammu and Kashmir on February 7.
All four Rajya Sabha members from Jammu and Kashmir are retiring between February 10 and 15.
Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Umang Narula told the Excelsior that notification for the election to four Rajya Sabha seats will be issued on January 21 while the candidates can file nomination papers till January 28. Scrutiny of documents will be held on January 29 while the candidates can withdraw their nominations till January 31.
Polling will be held in the Central Hall of Legislature here on February 7 from 9 am to 4 pm. Counting will be held on the same day from 5 pm onwards and results were expected to be declared by 7 pm.
All 87 newly elected MLAs comprised electoral college for election of four Rajya Sabha seats.
Narula said there was an impression that till the MLAs had taken oath or when the Assembly is under suspended animation, the MLAs can’t vote for Rajya Sabha elections. However, he added, the Election Commission of India has cited Supreme Court judgment, which says that since the Rajya Sabha elections were Constitutional requirement, they can be held even if the Assembly was suspended or the MLAs hadn’t taken oath.
“All 87 MLAs will be eligible to vote even if they hadn’t taken the oath. The Assembly has been constituted by the Election Department and the Election Commission has also notified it,” he said, adding taking the apex court guidelines into account the Election Commission of India today ordered elections to four Rajya Sabha seats.
Earlier, it was believed that the EC would defer the Rajya Sabha elections in view of Assembly being under suspended animation and that MLAs hadn’t taken oath as yet.
Four members of the Rajya Sabha retiring next month are Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad and PCC (I) chief Prof Saif-ud-Din Soz (both Congress), Mohammad Shafi Uri and Ghulam Nabi Ratanpuri (both NC). While Azad and Soz would retire on February 10, Uri and Ratanpuri would complete their six years tenure on February 15.
Sources said the election will be a major test for four main political parties in the Legislative Assembly and seven Independents and others as no political party has formed an alliance so far to form the Government. Presently, PDP is single largest party with 28 MLAs followed by BJP with 25, NC 15, Congress 12, People’s Conference 2, CPM 1 and rest are Independents including Pawan Gupta, Engineer Rashid, Hakim Yasin and Bakir Hussain Rizvi.
If the PDP and BJP join hands, they can safely win three seats. The NC and Congress combine can win one seat but going by the serious differences between the two parties, it is unlikely that they will join hands for Rajya Sabha elections. If NC and Congress put up separate candidates, they might end up without winning a single Rajya Sabha seat.
Sources said the Rajya Sabha elections could become testing ground for PDP-BJP alliance especially when the BJP was trying to gain majority in the Upper House of Parliament along with its allies. The PDP-BJP combine with some Independents could even get all four Rajya Sabha seats like NC-Congress coalition had done in 2009 when they had only 45 members in the Assembly (NC 28 and Congress 17). However, PDP-BJP combine would have 53 members in the Assembly and BJP even had the backing of two members of Sajjad Lone’s People’s Conference and could muster support of some more Independent candidates.
However, sources said, the things would be clear only when the PDP and BJP talks progressed. They pointed out that even if NC and Congress join hands if PDP and BJP cobble up alliance the NC would like its candidate for the Rajya Sabha seat as the party has 15 MLAs as against 12 of Congress.
If all parties go it alone, the PDP could win two seats and BJP one while the fourth seat could go to any party.
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