Gandhinagar:

The scrutiny of nomination papers of the 8 candidates for Rajyasabha polls for 4 seats from Gujarat due to be vacant on April 2,was completed today with the papers of seven candidates including all the prominent ones were found to be in order and valid while that of one independent candidate Paresh Moolani was rejected owing to not having any supporting MLAs signatures.

According to the office of returning officer A B Karova papers of the seven candidates including 3 of BJP; union MoS Agriculture Parshottam Rupala and MoS Road Transport, Highways, Shipping, Chemical and Fertilizer Mansukh Mandaviya and former Gujarat minister Kiritsinh Rana and BJP’s sole dummy candidate Rajni Patel and two of Congress candidates former MoS Railways Naran Rathwa and Ameeben Yajnik and Congress supported independent P K Valera were found to be valid and in order.

The only one rejected was that of independent Paresh Moolani which had not even a single signature of supporter MLAs (As per the rule it should have signature of 10 MLAs).

The returning officer had overruled and rejected the objections raised by both BJP and Congress with regard to nominations. While BJP had raised objection about the no dues certificate and its submission time and procedure of Congress candidate and former MoS Railways Naran Rathwa, the Congress has raised objections about the alleged incomplete address and signature in the forms of both BJP candidates.
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Senior BJP leaders DyCM Nitin Patel, MoS Home Pradipsinh Jadeja and party president Jeetu Vaghani and that from Congress Shaktisinh Gohil, Babu Mangukiya and Deputy LoP Shailesh Parmar were present during the scrutiny.

A total of 8 candidates had filed nominations.

The last date for withdrawal of names is March 15.

The election if needed would be held in the banquet hall of the assembly building on fourth floor on March 23.

The 8 candidates had filed their papers in total 13 sets of which Rupala and Mandaviya had filed in 3 sets each.

After the high voltage final hour nominations by Rathwa and some other candidates yesterday on the last day of filing papers, the scrutiny was also equally interesting.

If more than 4 candidates remain in the fray after March 15 there will be election for the 4 seats, all of which were earlier held by BJP.

DeshGujarat