At 92, BJP at its highest-ever seats tally in Rajya Sabha, Cong slide continues
New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has added nine members to its quota in the Rajya Sabha (RS), as its strength in the Upper House has increased to 92, though it is still short of the majority mark of 123. The BJP strength went up to 92 after nine of its candidates, eight in Uttar Pradesh and one in Uttarakhand, were elected unopposed on Monday.
The Samajwadi Party’s Ramgopal Yadav and the Bahujan Samaj Party’s Ramji Gautam won from Uttar Pradesh. The Congress lost one seat from Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand with the retirement of senior leaders P.L. Punia and Raj Babbar. The elected BJP members include Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri.
The BJP on its own is still 31 short of the halfway mark of 123 in the Upper House, but with allies JD(U), which has five members, and Ramdas Athawale of the Republican Party of India, the NDA tally stands at 98. Adding the AIADMK, which has nine MPs, and some parties from the Northeast, the NDA tally easily crosses 110.
This shows Congress’ continuous downward slide and irrelevance of the grand old party in the Indian political arena in past six years after BJP came to power at the Centre in 2014.
The Congress is now down to 38, its lowest-ever tally, though it remains the second-largest party in the Upper House with Ghulam Nabi Azad holding the post of the Leader of the Opposition. Mr. Azad too is up for retirement in February next year when all the four seats from Jammu and Kashmir fall vacant.
In the Lower House, the Congress does not have a single MP from Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Haryana, Delhi, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, Tripura, Nagaland, Mizoram, and Manipur.
The ten Rajya Sabha members from Uttar Pradesh who are retiring on November 25 include three from BJP — Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri, Arun Singh and Neeraj Shekhar, four from SP – Chandrapal Singh Yadav, Ram Gopal Yadav, Ram Prakash Verma, and Javed Ali Khan, two from BSP — Rajaram and Veer Singh, and PL Punia of the Congress.
Congress leader Raj Babbar is retiring as Rajya Sabha member from Uttarakhand. The seat has been secured by the BJP’s Naresh Bansal.
In March this year, Congress lost its government in Madhya Pradesh this year following the resignation of 22 party MLAs paving the way for BJP’s Shivraj Singh Chouhan to take over as Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister for the fourth time.
Congress also seems to have lost its relevance in big states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal as the party’s seats are continuously reduced.
