BJP, SP candidates step closer to unopposed election to UP legislative council

Independent candidate Mahesh Chandra Sharma’s nomination for the biennial election for 12 legislative council seats in Uttar Pradesh was rejected during the scrutiny of papers on Tuesday in Lucknow. It has bolstered the possibility of unopposed election of all the 10 BJP and the two Samajwadi Party (SP) candidates on Thursday.

Soon after BJP’s 10 candidates filed their nomination papers on Monday, Sharma threw his hat in the ring, becoming the 13th candidate in the fray, creating a distinct possibility of forcing a voting on January 28.

The returning officer, however, found his papers to be incomplete and rejected his nomination. “Nomination of Mahesh Chandra Sharma was rejected on the ground of several deficiencies. For example, he did not have even a single MLA as a proposer and neither did he submit the security deposit,” said special secretary, UP Assembly, Braj Bhushan Dubey.

“Under the current provisions, a candidate for the legislative council needs 10 MLAs as proposers and ₹10,000 as security deposit if he belongs to the general caste category or ₹5,000 in case he belongs to SC or ST category when he files nomination papers,” Dubey added.

With this, the unopposed election of all 10 BJP and two SP candidates is being seen as a foregone conclusion, provided none of the remaining candidates withdraw, which will make voting necessary.

“Unopposed election of all the 12 candidates is certain after 3pm on Thursday when the time for withdrawing names is over,” people in the know of the developments said.

The 10 BJP candidates are deputy chief minister Dinesh Sharma, state president Swatantra Dev Singh, ex-bureaucrat Arvind Kumar Sharma, Laxman Acharya, Govind Narayan Shukla, Salil Vishnoi, Ashwini Tyagi, Surendra Chaudhary, Dharamvir Prajapati and Kunwar Manvendra Singh.

SP has fielded Ahmad Hasan and Rajendra Chaudhary and they are also expected to get elected unopposed on Thursday.

“In the event of a voting, it could have been difficult for both the BJP and the SP to get their 10th and the second candidate elected respectively, purely on the basis of their own numerical strength in the legislative assembly,” officials pointed out.

Each candidate needs 32 votes from MLAs to get elected to the upper House. BJP has 310 MLAs in the lower House and the SP has 49. Apana Dal, BJP’s ally, has nine MLAs while SP’ ally Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party has four. The Congress has seven members.

“In case of polling, the BJP and the SP ran the risk of their members cross-voting, causing a big embarrassment to both,” said a leader, who didn’t wish to be named.