BJP's Rajya Sabha Overhaul A Preparation For Lok Sabha Elections? Here's What We Read Between The Lines Of Candidates List

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has declared 28 candidates for Rajya Sabha. It can secure victory for 27 of them on its own and one candidate in Odisha can win with the help of Biju Janata Dal (BJD).

The interesting fact is that only four of these have been renominated while 24 are new faces. Most of these new faces have been a long-time associate of the party, working at various positions within its organisation.

The only new entrants who have been given a Rajya Sabha ticket are former Congress leaders RPN Singh and Ashok Chavan, a former Maharashtra CM who joined the BJP just a couple of days ago.

Union Ministers Ashiwini Vaishnaw and L Murugan, BJP national president JP Nadda and senior BJP spokesperson Sudhanshu Trivedi are the only four who have been renominated.

This means that the other Rajya Sabha BJP MPs, whose terms are ending, may be asked to take the Lok Sabha route to come to the Parliament as Prime Minister Narendra Modi wished them to take a "feel" of the polls.

This includes Union ministers Bhupender Yadav, Dharmendra Pradhan, Mansukh Mandaviya, Narayan Rane, Parshottam Rupala, V Muraleedharan and Rajeev Chandrasekhar.

Other notable names who did not get renominated for the Rajya Sabha are BJP national media chief Anil Baluni, BJP national vice-president Saroj Pandey, and former Bihar deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi.

According to Indian Express, many of them can get a safe seat to contest like in Gujarat, Rupala can contest Amreli or Rajkot and Mandaviya can contest Bhavnagar or Porbandar or Surat.

Yadav can contest either Alwar in Rajasthan or Bhiwani–Mahendragarh in Haryana, Pandey from Korba in Chhattisgarh, Baluni from Pauri Garhwal in Uttarakhand and Muraleedharan from Attingal in Kerala.

However, the BJP does not want to bother those ministers who have a hectic portfolio like Vaishnaw has been renominated as he holds Railways, Communications, Electronics and Information Technology portfolios.

Similarly, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and External Affairs Minister Dr S Jaishankar will not be asked to contest Lok Sabha elections. Also, there are many years left in their Rajya Sabha tenure.

The party also wishes to enhance its public presence by sending senior leaders to contest on the ground. Earlier also it was seen that many leaders were moved from Centre to states in the recent Assembly elections.