The candidates from the BJP in Assam were elected unopposed to the Rajya Sabha on Monday, where the opposition did not feel it necessary to file nominations because two seats were vacant in the House.
The ruling party had declared the candidates of former Union Minister Rameswar Teli and ex-MLA Mission Ranjan Das earlier in the week for two vacant Rajya Sabha seats. Since there was no opposition candidate in the fray, both Teli and Das were declared elected unopposed by the state election officials.
The two BJP nominees later received their certificates after having won the uncontested elections. The two seats had fallen vacant after Sarbananda Sonowal and Kamakhya Prasad Tasa contested in the Lok Sabha elections and became MPs in the lower house of parliament.
Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma congratulated the two candidates via former Twitter: "Congratulate @BJP4Assam candidates, Shri Mission Ranjan Das and Shri @Rameswar_Teli, on being elected unopposed to the Rajya Sabha from Assam. My gratitude to our legislators and valued NDA partners for their unequivocal support to their candidature."
Sarma said that there was a lot of hope pinned on the tea tribes community and Barak Valley in the Upper House with the installation of both these very able and experienced leaders.
Dibrugarh Lok Sabha seat had gone in favour of Sarbananda Sonowal, while Kamakhya Prasad Tasa defeated the Congress candidate Roselina Tirkey from the Kaziranga parliamentary constituency. The inclusion of the Kaziranga Lok Sabha seat came about after the delimitation exercise scrapped the Kaliabor constituency and forced Congress leader Gaurav Gogoi to shift to the Jorhat parliamentary constituency.
Rameswar Teli had represented the Dibrugarh Lok Sabha seat twice in parliament, but was replaced when Sonowal was projected as a BJP candidate in Dibrugarh. There has been widespread anticipation that Teli would be given Sonowal's vacant seat in the Rajya Sabha.
A four-time elected member to the state assembly and a Hindu Bengali leader par excellence, Ranjan Das had been a loyalist to the BJP for long, and one of the very few leaders who had contributed to the establishment of BJP's organization in Assam right from the times of the party's inception. As earlier reported, he had also applied for a Rajya Sabha ticket, though it was denied to him. This time the BJP leadership took a decision to nominate a leader from the Hindu Bengalis, who spearhead the ruling party's stronghold in the state.
Read also | RG Kar Fiasco: CBI Questions Sandip Ghosh and Forensic Experts from Hospital
Read also| PM Modi Showcases 'Lakhpati Didis' Success Stories, Emphasizes Empowerment via SHGs
