Chandigarh, March 3 The BJP announced on Tuesday that it has nominated its former MP from Karnal, Sanjay Bhatia, for the Rajya Sabha election from Haryana.
Bhatia (58) is considered a confidant of Union Minister and former Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar.
He thanked his party leadership for nominating an "ordinary worker" like him as the party candidate, following the announcement. He had expressed this sentiment earlier as well, when he was fielded from Karnal Lok Sabha constituency in 2019.
As the BJP enjoys a majority in the 90-member Haryana Assembly, Bhatia is set to be elected to the Upper House.
In 2024, Bhatia, who was the sitting Karnal MP, made way for former chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar -- fielded by the party from the parliamentary seat.
Khattar was named BJP's Lok Sabha candidate on March 13, 2024, after he quit as the chief minister in a major shake-up in the state leadership by the party. The sitting MP from Karnal now and a Union minister, he was replaced as the chief minister by Nayab Singh Saini.
Bhatia had won from the Karnal constituency seat in 2019 by a massive margin of over 6.5 lakh votes.
From Haryana, two Rajya Sabha seats are falling vacant. BJP members Kiran Choudhry and Ram Chander Jangra are set to complete their terms on April 9.
In Haryana Assembly, the ruling BJP has 48 MLAs, Congress 37, the INLD has two, while three Independents support the ruling party. Thirty-one votes each are required for the two candidates to make it to the Rajya Sabha from Haryana.
Notifications for the polls were issued on February 26. Polling, if necessary, will be held on March 16 between 9 am and 4 pm, and votes will be counted from 5 pm the same day.
The last date of filing nomination is March 5. Scrutiny of nominations will be held on March 6, while the last date for the withdrawal of candidature is March 9.
Bhatia, who was born in 1967 in Panipat, was associated with the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) in his student life. Later, he managed various roles in the state BJP unit, on the district as well as the state level.
He is often referred to as the 'Chanakya' of the BJP's Haryana unit and has largely worked behind the scenes. Before being declared the BJP candidate for the Rajya Sabha seat from Haryana, he has been working to strengthen the party organisation in other states including West Bengal.
Meanwhile, Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini congratulated Bhatia on being nominated as the party candidate for Rajya Sabha polls.
"Heartiest congratulations and best wishes to senior BJP leader and former MP from Karnal, Shri Sanjay Bhatia ji, on being nominated as the Rajya Sabha candidate from Haryana," Saini said in a post on X in Hindi.
He said Bhatia's experience and active participation in the Upper House will certainly strengthen the issues of public interest.
According to the Election Commission's poll schedule issued recently, 37 Rajya Sabha seats fall vacant on April 2 and 9, from 10 states, including Haryana, Maharashtra, Himachal, and Tamil Nadu.
In August 2024, Kiran Choudhry, a former minister, was elected unopposed in the Rajya Sabha bypoll from Haryana. She had joined the BJP ahead of the October 2024 assembly elections after quitting the Congress.
The bypoll was necessitated after the Congress' Deepender Singh Hooda was elected to the Lok Sabha from Rohtak. His Rajya Sabha term was to end on April 9, 2026.