RS Polls: As Haryana, Raj, Maha & K'taka Gear Up for Close Fight, News18 Breaks Down the Number Game

A high-stakes battle is underway, as voting for four crucial states for 16 Rajya Sabha seats of Haryana, Rajasthan, Maharashtra and Karnataka began on Friday, as the number of candidates exceeds the seats going to the polls.

Resort politics has seen a huge comeback amid these elections, amid intense fears of poaching and horse trading of MLAs. News18 takes a look at the poll arithmetic of these four states ahead of voting and what could happen:

Rajasthan

An action-packed close race is expected on one of Rajasthan’s four Rajya Sabha seats, as the state has been gripped by political drama for the past ten days. Both BJP and Congress have accused each other of power play and horse-trading.

If independent media baron Subhash Chandra had not filed his nomination, the election could have gone uncontested. There are now five candidates for four seats, with Chandra backed by the opposition BJP, making the third Congress candidate’s job difficult.

Mukul Vasnik, Randeep Singh Surjewala, and Pramod Tiwari are the Congress’ three national leaders. They are all outsiders. The BJP has fielded Ghanshyam Tiwari, a veteran leader who once left the party to run against former Chief Minister Vasudhara Raje.

A candidate needs 41 first priority votes to win, according to the strength of the Rajasthan assembly. The ruling Congress is contesting three of the four seats, and it needs 123 votes to elect its candidates, but it only has 108. It requires 15 additional votes, and the party is relying on independents and other parties who support the government. Because one RLD MLA is a minister in the government, the required number is 14, according to a report by the Free Press Journal.

CM Ashok Gehlot has spent the last ten days organising the flock in order to win all three seats, and the party claims to have 126 votes for all of its candidates. However, the party is still short of two votes because one of the 13 independents has remained outside the Congress camp, and all eyes are now on this one independent and four MLAs from the Bhartiya Tribal Party (BTP) and the CPM.

The two BTP MLAs were seen with CM Gehlot on Tuesday, but their party president has issued a whip ordering them not to vote and has threatened them with strict action in accordance with the party’s constitution and anti-defection law. While two CPM members have yet to clarify their position.

The BJP, on the other hand, has 71 votes and has fielded an official candidate for one seat, so it has 30 surplus votes that will go to the independent Subhash Chandra, who only needs 11 more votes to win the fourth seat. Because one regional party RLP, which has three MLAs in the house, has decided to support Chandra, he now only needs eight votes to win.

Looking at the math of the votes, the result for three seats is almost certain. Two of them will go to the Congress, one to the BJP, and the battle is now for the fourth seat, which is being contested by independent Subhash Chandra.

Maharashtra

Political parties in Maharashtra have scrambled to finalise their strategy for the state’s six Rajya Sabha seats, which are being viewed as a platform for the ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) allies and opposition BJP to test their strength.

After more than two decades, Maharashtra will see a Rajya Sabha election, with seven candidates competing for six seats. The polling station will close at 4 p.m. The MVA’s allies – Shiv Sena, NCP, and Congress – had relocated their MLAs to various hotels and resorts in Mumbai before the elections.

The 288-member Legislative Assembly is the electoral college for the elections but the total votes have come down to 285 since there is a vacancy due to the death of Shiv Sena MLA Ramesh Latke. A special court on Thursday also rejectd the pleas filed by minister Nawab Malik and former minister Anil Deshmukh seeking a day’s bail to vote in the elections.

The six seats are being contested by Union Minister Piyush Goyal, Anil Bonde, Dhananjay Mahadik (BJP), Praful Patel (NCP), Sanjay Raut and Sanjay Pawar (Shiv Sena), and Imran Pratapgarhi (Congress). The sixth seat is up for grabs between the BJP’s Mahadik and the Sena’s Pawar.

Shiv Sena has 55 MLAs, NCP 53, Congress 44, BJP 106, Bahujan Vikas Aghadi (BVA) three, Samajwadi Party, AIMIM and Prahar Janshakti Party two each, MNS, CPI(M), PWP, Swabhimani Party, Rashtriya Samaj Paksh, Jansurajya Shakti Party, Krantikari Shetkari Party one each, and there are 13 independent legislators.

The number of first-choice votes required to elect a candidate has been reduced to 41. The Congress and NCP have decided to transfer their second preference votes to Shiv Sena candidate Sanjay Pawar.

In the race for the sixth seat, both the MVA parties and the BJP are counting on the 25 votes of smaller parties and independents. The cabinet includes three ministers from smaller parties and independents.

Haryana

The BJP and its allies have 57 MLAs in Haryana’s 90-member assembly, including former minister Krishna Lal Panwar. It also supports Kartikeya Sharma, an independent candidate. A candidate needs 31 seats to win.

The BJP is determined to deny a seat to Congress nominee and AICC general secretary Ajay Maken.

The Congress has 31 MLAs in the 90-member Haryana Assembly, which is just enough to ensure Ajay Maken’s victory. The BJP has fielded former Transport Minister Krishan Lal Panwar and is backing News X owner Kartikeya Sharma. The party is counting on its ally, the Jannayak Janata Party (JJP), to get Sharma elected. There are also seven Independents. Abhay Chautala of the INLD and Gopal Kanda of the Haryana Lokhit Party have both declared their support for Kartikeya Sharma.

Sharma will not be able to win unless a few Congress MLAs change sides or their votes are declared invalid. It is also unknown how independent MLA Balraj Kundu and the lone Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) MLA Abhay Singh Chautala will vote. Both or one of them may eventually abstain.

Karnataka

In Karnataka, the BJP, Congress, and JD(S) are attempting to woo MLAs from rival parties in order to ensure the victory of their candidates for the state’s hotly contested fourth Rajya Sabha (RS) seat. All three parties are strategizing in the hopes of gaining the support of the other on June 10. There are six candidates vying for four open seats. There are three from the BJP, two from the Congress, and one from the JD (S).

Congress and the JD(S) attempted to gain support from each other but failed, so both parties’ nominees are included in the pool of candidates.

The ruling BJP has 122 legislators (including two independents). Two of the party’s nominees will be easily elected. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and actor-politician Jaggesh will be duly elected. After the first two candidates are elected, the party will have 32 votes, 13 less than the number needed to elect their third candidate, Lahar Singh Siroya.

Opposition Jairam Ramesh and Mansoor Khan are the Congress’s first and second candidates, respectively. In the Assembly, the party has 70 MLAs (including one independent). It can easily guarantee the victory of one candidate, Ramesh. The party will then have 25 votes, 20 less than the number required to elect the additional nominee.

The JD(S) has 32 MLAs in the Assembly but cannot guarantee the victory of even one candidate. It is 13 votes short. To add to the regional party’s woes, four to five disgruntled MLAs have distanced themselves from the party in recent months, and the party fears cross-voting.

In the given scenario, the fourth candidate is most likely to be elected via second preference votes. The BJP and Congress are attempting to gain the support of JD(S) MLAs in order to gain more second preference votes. Meanwhile, the regional party has attempted to keep its flock together through one-on-one meetings with its legislators.

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