Rajya Sabha polls: BJP leaders Amit Shah, Smriti Irani and Balwantsinh Rajput file nominations

Gandhinagar: BJP chief Amit Shah, Union minister Smriti Irani and newly inducted former Congress MLA Balwantsinh Rajput , who resigned on Thursday and joined the saffron party, filed their nomination papers for the upcoming Rajya Sabha polls on Friday. [caption id=“attachment_3868065” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  BJP president Amit Shah handovers his nomination for Rajya Sabha election to election officer BM Patel in Gandhinagar. PTI[/caption] While Shah and Irani were nominated by the central leadership a few days back, Rajput, who was Congress’ chief whip in the Assembly, was declared the BJP’s third candidate shortly after he quit both from the House and the party. Rajput is pitted against senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel , who has been re-nominated for the 8 August Rajya Sabha election in Gujarat. Of the total 11 Rajya Sabha members from the state, the term of three — Smriti Irani and Dilipbhai Pandya (both BJP) and Ahmed Patel — is ending on 18 August. The Congress nominee can sail through if he musters the support of 47 MLAs. In the 182-member Assembly, the strength of Congress has gone down to 51, as six of its MLAs have resigned since Thursday. While three MLAs, including Rajput, quit on Thursday and joined the ruling party, as many others resigned on Friday. It is believed that the resignations have been orchestrated at the behest of former Congress strongman Shankersinh Vaghela , who had resigned from the party as also as the Leader of Opposition (LoP) last week. He, however, continues to be an MLA and said he would resign from the Assembly after the Rajya Sabha polls. Talking to media after the trio filed their nominations on Friday, BJP in-charge for Gujarat, Bhupendra Yadav exuded confidence that all the party candidates will win the election easily. When asked about the possibility of Vaghela joining the BJP, Yadav said it is up to him to decide. “Vaghela will have to take that call. However, the points raised by him while leaving the party speak volumes about how the Congress is functioning. Our doors are open for all those who believe in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s development agenda,” Yadav told reporters.