In BJP’s RS nominations for UP, Hardeep Singh Puri and 6 other sitting MPs dropped

Lucknow, Oct 5 (IANS) The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Monday announced eight candidates for biennial Rajya Sabha elections in Uttar Pradesh, seeking to strike a balance between caste representation and organisational experience. Two women candidates figure in the list, underscoring the party’s thrust on women's empowerment and women-led development. 

However, the most conspicuous absence from the list is the Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas, Hardeep Singh Puri. Besides him, another Union Minister, BL Verma and all other sitting MPs have been left out of the nominations.

The tenure of Union Ministers Hardeep Singh Puri and BL Verma in the Upper House is set to end next month.

Other sitting Rajya Sabha MPs who failed to find their names in the list include Arun Singh, Seema Dwivedi, Neeraj Shekhar, Brij Lal and Geeta Shakya. Dinesh Sharma, who previously held a Rajya Sabha seat from the state, was made the Lieutenant Governor of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

For the upcoming October 16 biennial elections, the party announced eight names including two women candidates whose names are Dharampal Singh, Radhakant Ojha, Prakash Pal, Vidyasagar Sonkar, Gopi Krishna Pandey, Priyanka Singh Rawat, Ram Pratap Singh Chauhan and Shruti Gangwar.

The BJP list comprises three OBC candidates, two Scheduled Caste candidates and three upper-caste candidates. 

Dharampal Singh, BJP MLA from Aonla in Bareilly district, is a known face from the Lodh community, an influential community in the Bundelkhand region. He has been a two-time minister in the Yogi Adityanath government.

Ram Pratap Singh Chauhan is the state BJP general secretary, overseeing many key party campaigns in the state.

The OBC candidates in the list come from Lodhi, Pal and Kurmi communities, while the upper-caste nominees comprise two Brahmins and one Rajput.

The women nominees are Shruti Gangwar, daughter of Jharkhand Governor Santosh Gangwar and former Barabanki MP Priyanka Singh Rawat, who won the Lok Sabha seat in 2014 by defeating Congress veteran PL Punia.

The social engineering of caste combinations for the biennial elections also reflects the party’s focus on the high-stakes Assembly elections, slated for next year.

--IANS

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