The Bharatiya Janata Party has secured all three Rajya Sabha seats from Madhya Pradesh unopposed, a development overshadowed by the Congress party’s legal challenge in the Supreme Court against the rejection of its candidate Meenakshi Natarajan’s nomination.
IMAGE: BJP national general secretary Tarun Chugh (R), with his election certificate, shows a victory sign after being declared elected unopposed in the Madhya Pradesh Legislative Council (Rajya Sabha) biennial election 2026 results, in Bhopal on Thursday. Newly elected BJP MLCs Rajnish Agrawal (C) and Mahesh Kevat also present. Photograph: ANI Photo
Key Points
- Three BJP candidates — Tarun Chugh, Rajneesh Agarwal, and Mahesh Kewat — have been declared elected unopposed to the Rajya Sabha from Madhya Pradesh.
- The Congress party’s sole candidate, Meenakshi Natarajan, had her nomination rejected by the returning officer for allegedly concealing information about a court complaint in Telangana.
- Natarajan has moved the Supreme Court against the rejection, with senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi arguing that only cases with a minimum sentence of two years and framed charges need disclosure.
- The Supreme Court questioned the maintainability of the petition while the election process was ongoing, with a hearing scheduled for Friday.
- Congress leaders have termed the incident ‘seat chori‘ and vowed to fight the rejection both politically and legally, citing discrepancies in similar cases.
The returning officer on Thursday declared the three Bharatiya Janata Party candidates elected unopposed in the biennial Rajya Sabha elections in Madhya Pradesh, even as Congress candidate Meenakshi Natarajan has moved the Supreme Court against the rejection of her nomination.
Returning Officer Arvind Sharma announced that the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Tarun Chugh, Rajneesh Agarwal and Mahesh Kewat have been elected.
BJP Candidates Collect Certificates
The trio visited the assembly complex here and collected their certificates of victory before displaying them to the media.
They also met state BJP president Hemant Khandelwal later.
‘Your dedication to the organisation, tireless hard work, and extensive experience in public service will undoubtedly present issues of Madhya Pradesh and national interest, effectively in the Upper House of Parliament. I am confident that under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, you will all play a crucial role in realising the vision of a developed India in 2047 and will provide new energy to the aspirations of the people,’ Khandelwal said in a post on X, wishing the three leaders a successful parliamentary term.
Congress Nomination Rejected
The Congress had nominated Meenakshi Natarajan as its sole candidate, but returning officer Sharma rejected her nomination on Tuesday on the ground that she concealed information about a court complaint filed against her in Telangana in the Form 26 submitted with her nomination.
BJP candidate Mahesh Kewat had filed a complaint in this regard.
The Supreme Court would be hearing Natarajan’s petition against the Returning Officer’s decision on Friday.
A partial working day bench of Justices Prashant Kumar Mishra and Atul S Chandurkar, however, also questioned how the petition was maintainable while the election process was ongoing.
Senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi, appearing for Natarajan, argued before the Supreme Court on Thursday that a candidate is required to disclose only the criminal cases carrying a minimum sentence of at least two years, whereas in the present case, only summons have been issued.
Electoral Dynamics and Congress Reaction
Voting for the three Rajya Sabha seats from Madhya Pradesh was scheduled for June 18.
These seats were to fall vacant with the expiry of the terms of BJP’s George Kurien and Sumer Singh Solanki and senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh on June 21.
The BJP has 164 MLAs in the 230-member Madhya Pradesh Assembly while the Congress has 62 MLAs eligible to vote.
With each Rajya Sabha candidate requiring 58 votes to win, the BJP was assured of winning two seats comfortably, while the Congress had enough votes to win a single seat.
But the saffron party fielded a third candidate, whose victory would have depended on cross-voting or abstention by opposition members had polling taken place.
Speaking in Delhi, Congress general secretary K C Venugopal said what happened in Madhya Pradesh was ‘seat chori (seat theft)’.
“There is no criminal case against Meenakshi Natarajan. In Jharkhand a BJP-backed person’s nomination was allowed despite him leaving two columns empty. It was wrong but it was accepted,” Venugopal said, adding that they will fight against the rejection of Natarajan’s nomination ‘politically and legally’.
Legal Opinion on Disclosure Requirements
Speaking to PTI Videos, former principal secretary of the Madhya Pradesh assembly Bhagwandev Israni opined that Natarajan was not required to disclose the case in question against her as no first information report (FIR) or charge sheet had been filed.
Natarajan was not given a chance by the authorities, he said, adding that the Election Commission needs to intervene as courts generally do not look into such matters once the election process begins.
Under section 33A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, a contesting candidate must declare pending criminal cases in which one is accused of an offence punishable with imprisonment of two years or more only if a competent court has framed charges, said Israni.
Congress leaders had approached the Election Commission on Wednesday, but no decision was taken, he noted.
