RS polls: Easy win for Trinamul Congress in West Bengal

Kolkata: The Trinamul Congress on Friday comfortably won four seats out of five in the Rajya Sabha (RS) Elections while ensuring the victory for Abhishek Manu Singhvi of the Congress for the fifth seat with its support to the Upper House of the Parliament from West Bengal. The ruling party’s win is bound to come as a boost further ahead of the ensuing Panchayat Elections in the state.

Among the four Trinamul candidates, Subhashish Chakraborty was elected with the highest number of votes: 54 in the 294-seat West Bengal Assembly where the polls were held throughout the day during which chief minister Mamata Banerjee and leader of the Opposition Abdul Mannan cast their ballots alongwith other MLAs from all parties.

He was followed by Nadimul Haque and Abir Biswas with 52 votes to each, according to the election results which were announced after the counting was held. Another Trinamul candidate Santanu Sen was elected to the RS with 51 votes. This is the second consequtive time Mr Haque, an editor of an Urdu daily, has been elected to the RS. For the three others it is the first time.

Mr Singhvi who was supported by the Trinamul MLAs got 47 votes, two votes less from 49, the required figure for each candidate to win. A Trinamul veteran explained that the Congress candidate got 17 additional votes from the ruling party apart from his party MLAs.

Left Front candidate Rabin Deb from the CPI(M) who contested for the fifth seat against Mr Singhvi, got 30 votes only as the Left has the same figure of MLAs in the assembly.

Speaking about his victory Mr Singhvi later said, “It is humbling and uplifting. It is a result of cooperation between different groups and MLAs.” He also met Ms Banerjee in the Assembly.

Votes of two Trinamul MLAs Zakir Hossain of Jangipur in Murshidabad and Mrigen Maity of Midnapore in West Midnapore were however cancelled due to errors, sources indicated.