Congress names Kharge among seven candidates for Rajya Sabha polls

Congress has announced seven candidates for the Rajya Sabha elections, fielding party chief Mallikarjun Kharge and Pawan Khera among others. The list includes nominees from Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan and Jharkhand ahead of polling on June 18

New Delhi: The Congress on Thursday announced its list of seven candidates for the Rajya Sabha elections, fielding party chief Mallikarjun Kharge from Karnataka along with its media department head Pawan Khera.

The party also nominated AICC secretary for Kerala and Lakshadweep Mansoor Ali Khan as its candidate from Karnataka. Khan unsuccessfully contested the 2024 Lok Sabha election from Bangalore Central constituency.

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According to a communication from AICC general secretary, organisation, K C Venugopal, the Congress has fielded senior leader Meenakshi Natarajan, a former Lok Sabha MP from Mandsaur, as its candidate from Madhya Pradesh.

Natarajan is currently the in-charge of party affairs in Telangana. She will get the Rajya Sabha seat that is falling vacant following the end of tenure of former Madhya Pradesh chief minister Digvijaya Singh.

The Congress fielded Praveen Chakravarty, its head of the Data Analytics and Professionals Wing, from Tamil Nadu, besides renominating Neeraj Dangi from Rajasthan.

The party has got the lone seat from Tamil Nadu after the resignation of AIADMK MP C Ve Shanmugam, who was elected to the state assembly.

Pranav Jha, who is currently attached to the Congress president, has been nominated from Jharkhand. The Congress will get one of the two seats from Jharkhand.

“The Congress President, Shri Mallikarjun Kharge, has approved the candidature of the following persons as Congress candidates to contest the biennial/bye-elections to the Council of States from the states mentioned,” Venugopal said.

The candidates thanked the party leadership for nominating them as party candidate for the Rajya Sabha elections.

“I accept this responsibility with humility. Once I get elected a Member of Parliament, I will work to uphold the highest standards of parliamentary conduct, to raise the voice of the people who are too often unheard, and to stand by the values and ideology the Congress has always represented,” Mansoor Ali Khan said on X.

The Rajya Sabha elections will be held on June 18. The last date for filing of nominations is June 8.