Ahmedabad: Four candidates for Rajya Sabha - Congress` Madhusudan Mistry and three from BJP – were on Friday elected unopposed to the Rajya Sabha from Gujarat.
"Today on the last day of withdrawal of forms, after those who had filed dummy forms withdrew from the race, just four candidates were in fray for four seats.
They have been declared elected," Gujarat Assembly secretary DM Patel said .
Mistry is a general secretary of Congress and also in-charge of party affairs in Uttar Pradesh.
He lost in the last Lok Sabha election from Sabarkantha.
From BJP, Sambhuprasad Tundiya, Chunibhai Gohil and Lalsinh Vadodiya, all former MLAs, were elected.
They had been handpicked by Chief Minister Narendra Modi keeping in mind the regional and caste equations ahead of the Lok Sabha elections, BJP sources said here.
Tundiya is a religious leader from a Dalit community, and was an MLA from Dasada in Surendranagar district from 2007 to 2012. He was not given ticket in 2012.
Gohil, from Veraval, represents fishermen community. He was suspended from the BJP before 2007 election along with half a dozen other MLAs, who were part of the anti-Modi group in the party led by former Chief Minister Suresh Mehta and Gordhan Zadafia. He later rejoined the party.
Vadodiya is a strong Kshatriya leader and a former MLA from Anand. He switched over to Congress before the 2007 elections and won from Umreth in Anand district. In 2012, Vadodiya was denied ticket by Congress following which he came back to the BJP fold.
The party, under its no-repeat policy, decided not to nominate any of its three outgoing Rajya Sabha MPs: Purushottam Rupala, Bharatsinh Parmar and Natuji Thakore.
Earlier, there was speculation that senior leader LK Advani would be nominated for the Rajya Sabha from Gujarat, but the BJP veteran made it clear that he would like to contest the Lok Sabha election.
