Keen contest on two RS seats

Tribune News Service

Jammu, January 29

The election to two of the four seats of the Rajya Sabha is likely to be keenly contested on February 7.

All eyes are on the contest between Congress stalwart and current Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad, Peoples Democratic Party nominee Nazir Ahmed Laway and BJP candidate Chander Mohan Sharma.

All three of them have filed their nomination papers for two RS seats notified under the third notification by the Returning Officer. These seats are currently being represented by National Conference leaders Ghulam Nabi Rattanpuri and Muhammad Shafi Uri. All 87-elected MLAs will have to vote only once for these two seats. One of the two seats is all set to go to the PDP-BJP alliance but for the other seat, the Congress candidate has an edge.

On the other two seats, for which two different notifications were issued, the PDP-BJP combination with 53 MLAs doesn’t have any threat from the NC-Congress combine, which only has 27 MLAs. The PDP-BJP combine is all set to get these two seats.

For the remaining two seats, candidates with 29 votes will emerge as winners. Now the contest has become interesting and the key lies with the seven MLAs, who are either Independents or are representing smaller parties. The Congress is confident that out of these seven MLAs, they have the support of at least three. “This number could also increase as two more MLAs haven’t yet opened their cards,” said a senior Congress leader.

Meanwhile, three MLAs, Muhammad Yousuf Tarigami, Hakeem Muhammad Yaseen and Engineer Rashid, on whom the Congress is relying heavily, will be meeting in Srinagar in the first week of February to decide their stand.

Related report on page 4