Srinagar: The Election Commission of India (ECI) has issued three separate notifications for the nomination of candidates for the 4 seats of the Rajya Sabha of Jammu and Kashmir, which were vacant since February 2021.
In three separate notifications, the Election Commission of India (ECI) has announced that the last date for filing nominations is October 13, 2025, followed by scrutiny of nomination papers on October 14. Candidates will have time till October 16 to withdraw their nominations. Polling for candidates by members of the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly will be held on October 24.
The Election Commission has issued three separate notifications. 2 members of the Rajya Sabha – Fayaz Mir of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Shamsher Singh of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – retired on February 2, 2021. Two members Ghulam Nabi Azad and Nazir Ahmed Lave retired on February 15, 2021.
According to the notification, there will be two separate elections for the first and second seats, and a joint election for the remaining two seats.
With the nomination notification issued, the political parties of Jammu and Kashmir, the National Conference, the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party will work together to select candidates for the elections.
“National Conference’s provincial president Shaukat Ahmed Mir said the party leadership has not yet held “”a single meeting”” to discuss candidates for the Rajya Sabha elections.” However, everyone in the party would want Dr. Farooq Abdullah is in the Rajya Sabha because he is the most senior leader of Jammu and Kashmir and his voice should be heard in Parliament.
Amid NC chief spokesperson Tanveer Sadiq’s statements and speculations that the party will contest three seats, which the ruling party is likely to win given the math of its members in the assembly. However, Mir said that since no meeting has taken place so far, neither the candidates nor the number of seats to be contested by the party has been decided. “””These are all speculations,”” he told ETV India.”
The National Conference has 41 MLAs in the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly. Along with this, 6 Congress MLAs and 5 Independents along with one CPI(M) MLA Yusuf Tarigami has the support. This brings the number of its legislators to 53.
The 90-member Jammu and Kashmir Assembly currently has 88 MLAs as two seats – Budgam in Kashmir and Nagrota in Jammu – fell vacant after Chief Minister Omar Abdullah vacated the Budgam seat and retained the Ganderbal seat and the death of BJP MLA Devendra Rana in November.
The smaller opposition parties, the Peoples Democratic Party, have three MLAs, while the Peoples Conference has a legislator Sajjad Lone, an Aam Aadmi Party legislator, Mehraj Malik and an independent legislator Sheikh Khusharshid (affiliated with Engineer Rashid’s AIP).
The Congress, which has 6 MLAs in the House, has also given signs of bargaining with the National Conference for a Rajya Sabha seat. “But Jammu and Kashmir unit Congress president Tariq Hameed Karra said that “”official”” talks between the two coalition partners have not yet begun, but “”informal talks”” are going on at the central level.”
“””The final decision about the elections will be taken by the central leadership of the party,”” Karra told ETV India.” There will be a dialogue between the central level leadership and the NC leadership, which the state level leadership will take forward.
The main opposition party BJP, which has 28 MLAs, is likely to win one seat, has announced to contest all 4 seats. BJP spokesperson Sunil Sethi said the party will field three candidates. The BJP’s Jammu and Kashmir unit held a meeting on elections and candidates in Jammu on October 4. Sethi said the top leadership of the BJP in New Delhi will take the final decision on the candidates.
