2017 Rajya Sabha elections

Elections were held in India on 21 July and 8 August 2017 as nomination contests by state legislators routinely for ten members of the Rajya Sabha across three states, replacing those who retired in July and August 2017.[1] The State Legislatures which contribute in this six-year minor elections/nomination cycle are Goa, Gujarat and West Bengal. The mechanism is the single transferable vote (STV) among legislators, meaning nominations may be unopposed contests (commonly in states with an absolute majority for a particular party in its legislative, public elections). The open ballot is used rather than secret ballot, allowing public scrutiny.

2017 Rajya Sabha elections
21 July and 8 August 2017
10 seats to the Rajya Sabha
  First party Second party
 
Leader Arun Jaitley Ghulam Nabi Azad
Party BJP INC
Alliance NDA UPA
Leader since 2 June 2014 8 June 2014
Leader's seat Gujarat Jammu and Kashmir
Seats before 56 60
Seats after 58 58
Seat change Increase 2 Decrease 2
  Third party Fourth party
 
Leader Derek O'Brien Sitaram Yechury
Party TMC CPI(M)
Alliance Federal Front Left Front
Leader since 19 August 2011 August 2005
Leader's seat West Bengal West Bengal
Seats before 12 8
Seats after 13 7
Seat change Increase 1 Decrease 1

The year also saw five by-elections one of which saw a state's co-representative change, owing to a change in the make-up of the relevant legislature in the intervening three years.

The 2017 six-yearly cycle is of great importance to Goa, where its sole Rajya Sabha member is chosen by its current legislators; 3 of 11 members for Gujarat and 6 of 16 members are also so elected (see cross-party nomination contests) in this cycle.

The outcome in party terms, which tends to reflect the current popular political make-up of the relevant legislatures, was primarily no change (12 of the 15 seats involved in 2017). The other three seats to reflect state political changes were two intervening sufficient mathematical state gains in support for the VJP at state elections, at the expense of the INC entitling two VJP nominations rather than INC and one state gain in support (sufficient proportional representation swing) for the AITC which had cost the Communist Party of India (Marxist), specifically in West Bengal.

Members retiring

The following members retired in 2017.

State Retiring MP Party Date of retirement Reference
Goa Shantaram Naik INC 28 July 2017 [1]
Gujarat Ahmed Patel INC 18 August 2017
Smriti Irani BJP
Dilip Pandya
West Bengal Sukhendu Sekhar Roy AITC
Derek O'Brien
Debabrata Bandyopadhyay
Dola Sen
Sitaram Yechury CPI(M)
Pradip Bhattacharya INC

Members elected

Goa

Goa's main party in its legislature saw its nomination contest for Goa's sole seat on July 21, 2017.[2]

Seat No Former MP Former Party Elected MP Elected Party Reference
1 Shantaram Naik INC Vinay Tendulkar BJP [3]

Gujarat

Gujarat had an election for 3 Rajya Sabha seats on August 8, 2017.[4]

Seat No Former MP Former Party Elected MP Elected Party Reference
1 Smriti Irani BJP Smriti Irani BJP
2 Dilip Pandya Amit Shah
3 Ahmed Patel INC Ahmed Patel INC

West Bengal

West Bengal had elected the 6 Rajya Sabha seat unopposed.[4]

Seat No Former MP Former Party Elected MP Elected Party Reference
1 Derek O'Brien AITC Derek O'Brien AITC [5]
2 Dola Sen Dola Sen
3 Sukhendu Sekhar Roy Sukhendu Sekhar Roy
4 Debabrata Bandyopadhyay Manas Bhunia
5 Sitaram Yechury CPI(M) Shanta Chhetri
6 Pradip Bhattacharya INC Pradip Bhattacharya INC

By-elections

In addition to scheduled elections, unforeseen vacancies, caused by members' resignation or death, may also be filled via By-elections.

West Bengal
S.No Former MP Party Date of Vacancy Elected MP Party Date of appointment Date of retirement
1 Mithun Chakraborty All India Trinamool Congress 29 Dec 2016 Manish Gupta All India Trinamool Congress 2 March 2017 3 April 2020

Odisha
  • On 21 March 2017, Bishnu Charan Das of Odisha resigned after he was appointed as Deputy Chairman of Odisha State Planning Board.[7]
S.No Former MP Party Date of Vacancy Elected MP Party Date of appointment Date of retirement
1 Bishnu Charan Das Biju Janata Dal 21 March 2017 Pratap Keshari Deb Biju Janata Dal 18 May 2017 1 July 2022

Manipur
S.No Former MP Party Date of Vacancy Elected MP Party Date of appointment Date of retirement
1 Haji Abdul Salam Indian National Congress 28 February 2017 Bhabananda Singh Bharatiya Janata Party 25 May 2017 9 April 2020

Madhya Pradesh
S.No Former MP Party Date of Vacancy Elected MP Party Date of appointment Date of retirement
1 Anil Madhav Dave Bharatiya Janata Party 30 June 2016 Sampatiya Uike Bharatiya Janata Party 1 August 2017 29 June 2022

Rajasthan
S.No Former MP Party Date of Vacancy Elected MP Party Date of appointment Date of retirement
1 Venkaiah Naidu Bharatiya Janata Party 10 August 2017 Alphons Kannanthanam Bharatiya Janata Party 9 November 2017 4 July 2022

References
  1. "Statewise Retirement". 164.100.47.5. Retrieved 12 June 2016.
  2. "Biennial Election to the Council of States (Rajya Sabha) from Goa" (PDF). ECI New Delhi. Retrieved 1 September 2017.
  3. Kamat, prakash (21 July 2017). "Vinay Tendulkar wins Goa RS seat". The Hindu. Retrieved 8 August 2017.
  4. "Biennial Elections to the Council of States from the States of Gujarat and West Bengal and bye election to Council of States from Madhya Pradesh" (PDF). ECI, New Delhi. Retrieved 1 September 2017.
  5. "Ten Rajya Sabha seats up for grabs in Gujarat, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh: Who are the candidates?". First Post. Retrieved 8 August 2017.
  6. "Mithun Chakraborty Resigns From Rajya Sabha Citing Health Reasons". NDTV. 26 December 2016. Retrieved 31 December 2016.
  7. "Rajya Sabha bypoll in Manipur, Odisha on May 25". Hindustan Times. New Delhi. 3 May 2017. Retrieved 12 May 2017.
  8. "Environment Minister Anil Madhav Dave passes away". The Hindu. 18 May 2017. Retrieved 2 June 2017.
  9. "When Venkaiah Naidu wanted to quit Rajya Sabha, BJP but Amit Shah stopped him". Retrieved 11 August 2017.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.