India News | Guj RS Bypolls: Two BJP Nominees Expected to Win Unopposed

Ahmedabad, Feb 18 (PTI) BJP candidates on Thursday filed nominations for bypolls to two Rajya Sabha seats in Gujarat and are expected to be declared winners as the Congress did not field any candidate, an official said.

Thursday was the last day for filing nominations.

As the main opposition party in the state did not field any candidate, two BJP candidates are expected to be declared winners in the elections scheduled for March 1, returning officer C B Pandya said.

"BJP's Dinesh Anavadiya and Ram Mokariya and their two dummy candidates submitted their papers. We have not received any nominations from Congress," he said.

In this situation, voting will not be necessary as the dummy candidates are expected to withdraw, Pandya said.

The last date for withdrawing nominations is February 22.

Anavadiya is the state BJP's OBC Morcha president, while Mokariya runs a courier company.

The byelections were necessitated by the death of Congress veteran Ahmed Patel in November and BJP leader Abhay Bhardwaj in December last year.

The Rajya Sabha terms of Patel and Bhardwaj were to end in August 2023 and June 2026.

Anavadiya has been chosen by the BJP to fill up Patel's seat, while Mokariya will replace Bhardwaj.

The BJP and Congress have 111 and 65 MLAs in the Gujarat Legislative Assembly, respectively.

The Congress did not have the numbers to win even one seat as voting was to be conducted separately for the two seats.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)