Kolkata, March 9 – Five candidates vying for the five Rajya Sabha seats from West Bengal were declared unopposed on Monday. Of the five candidates, four are from the Trinamool Congress and one from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Monday was the last date for withdrawing nominations, and since the deadline passed without any withdrawals, all five candidates were declared unopposed.
After being elected, Trinamool Congress candidate Babul Supriyo, a former West Bengal Minister of Information Technology and a singer-turned-politician, said his main task as a member of the Upper House of Parliament would be to highlight issues related to West Bengal.
"As a former Union Minister of State, the Rajya Sabha is familiar territory for me," said Supriyo, who is also a former two-time Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Lok Sabha member and a former Union Minister of State in the Narendra Modi-led Union Cabinet.
Another winner from the Trinamool Congress and the recently retired Director General of the West Bengal Police, Rajeev Kumar, said that being elected to the Upper House of Parliament was undoubtedly a matter of honor and responsibility for him.
"I will try to give my best in this new role," Kumar said.
Popular Bengali actress Koel Mallick was the third Trinamool Congress candidate to be elected to the Rajya Sabha.
"I want the blessings of everyone. I want to work for the people of West Bengal as a member of the Upper House of Parliament," she said.
However, the fourth elected Trinamool Congress candidate and senior advocate Menaka Guruswamy, also a leading figure in the LGBTQ+ movement in the country, was not available for comment.
The sole BJP candidate elected, Rahul Sinha – also the party’s former national secretary and former state president in West Bengal – said that although he had been involved in organizational politics for years, he was happy to enter parliamentary politics for the first time.
"I am confident that I will quickly adapt to this new role. I will try to work in parliamentary politics with the same dedication and honesty that I have shown in organizational politics for all these years," Sinha said.