JMM chief Shibu Soren, BJP leader Deepak Prakash win RS polls in Jharkhand

Former Jharkhand chief minister and JMM chief Shibu Soren and BJP state unit president Deepak Prakash won the two Rajya seats from the state on Friday.

Out of the total 79 votes, Prakash secured 31 votes while 30 MLAs voted for Soren.

Congress candidate Shahzada Anwar finished third, securing 18 votes. Soren enters the Upper House for the third time while it is the maiden entry for Prakash.

The polling for the two Rajya Sabha seats is necessitated as the tenure of Independent member Parimal Nathwani and RJDs Prem Chand Gupta ended in April.

The numbers secured by the three candidates suggest that voting took place as per the strength of the parties helped by their supporting groups.

According to the Jharkhand Assembly website, the BJP has 25 MLAs in the House and with the Election Commission declaring Babulal Marandi as a BJP voter, Prakash secured 26 votes.

With Independent MLAs Saryu Roy and Amit Yadav, and the two-member AJSU party voting for him, Prakash got 30 votes and his 31st voter could have come from one of the free hand voters.

Soren, who finished second with 30 votes, got votes from his 29 JMM MLAs and Pradip Yadav may have voted for the former chief minister, sources said.

The Congress, which has 15 seats in the House, could manage only 18 votes for its candidate. It could have got votes from RJD MLA and Labour Minister Satyanand Bhokta as the party has a tie-up with the Congress in Bihar; the only MLA of the CPI-ML-Liberation Vinod Kumar Singh; and free-hand voter Bandhu Tirkey, they added.

Out of the 82 members in the House, 79 MLAs had cast their votes, while two seats are vacant and the only nominated MLA has no right to vote in the Rajya Sabha elections.

Meanwhile, officials said one of the two booths, marked as COVID-19 booth, was left unused as there was no case of any such infection during thermal screening of legislators before they were allowed to enter into the assembly to cast votes.