By-election to 3 Rajya Sabha seats from Odisha on July 5: ECI

New Delhi: The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Saturday issued notification for by-election to fill six vacant Rajya Sabha seats in Odisha, Bihar and Gujarat.

As per ECI, three of these seats are in Odisha, two in Gujarat and one in Bihar. Four of these vacancies are a result of Rajya Sabha members from these states getting elected to the Lok Sabha in the just concluded general elections.
The by-elections would take place on July 5, 2019 for the six vacant seats.

It is pertinent to mention here that three seats in the Council of States or Rajya Sabha from Odisha have fallen vacant following resignation of BJD leaders- Achyuta Samanta, Pratap Keshari Deb and Somuya Ranjan Patnaik necessitating the by-election.

While Samanta resigned after being elected to the 17th Lok Sabha, Deb vacated the Rajya Sabha post on June 9 after getting elected to the 16th Odisha Legislative Assembly. Patnaik also resigned as a RS member on June 6 after being elected to the Odisha Legislative Assembly.

Term of office of Samanta expires on April 3, 2024 while Deb’s Rajya Sabha member tenure was up to July 1, 2022. On the other hand, Patnaik’s term of office was up to April 3, 2024.

Sources said as BJD has 112 MLAs in the 16th Odisha Legislative Assembly, election of the party nominees to the Council of States is a merely a formality. Names of Prasanna Kumar Patasani and Ramesh Chandra Chyau Patnaik are doing rounds to be nominated as BJD candidates for the Upper House.

Though Anubhav Mohanty has also resigned as an RS member, the ECI has not issued notification for the vacant seat as his term of office was less than one year.

This apart, the ECI has issued notification for by-election to two RS seats from Gujarat and one from Bihar.

The ECI will release an official notification regarding the by-election on June 18. As per the schedule, thee last day for filing nominations is June 25 and the counting of votes will be done on July 5 at 5 pm, an hour after polling ends.

The bypoll process has to be completed before July 9.