Shinde, Patel, Arjun, Jaitley's papers pass scrutiny

New Delhi Mar 18 (UNI) The nomination papers of Union Ministers Arjun Singh, Sushilkumar Shinde, Praful Patel, BJP leader Arun Jaitley and former Lok Sabha speaker Manohar Joshi (Shiv Sena) for the March 28 biennial elections to the Rajya Sabha were found to be in order after scrutiny today.

Meanwhile, the nomination papers of some independent candidates were rejected for lack of requisite details.

The last day of withdrawal of nomination papers is March 20.

The papers of all the 13 candidates -- who had filed nominations for 10 Rajya Sabha seats in Uttar Pradesh -- were found valid.

Principal secretary (Legislative Assembly) R P Pandey, who is also the returning officer for the polls, confirmed that all the nominations were found valid.

Altogether 13 candidates had filed nominations for the 10 RS seats in UP.

Similarly for 13 Legislative Council (LC) seats, 15 candidates had filed nominations. The scrutiny for their nominations would be held later this evening. Candidates can withdraw papers on March 20.

Mr Janeshwar Mishra, Mr Banwari Lal Kanchal, Mr Veerpal Singh, Mr Virendra Bhatia, Mr Mahendra Mohan Gupta (all Samajwadi Party), Mr Maulana Mahmood Madni (RLD) and Mr Azad Kumar Kardam (Congress) filed their nominations for the Rajya Sabha yesterday -- the last date for filing nominations.

Candidates for the LC seats, who filed their nominations yesterday, were Mr Naresh Chandra Uttam, Mr Khawaja Halim, Mr Kashinath, Mr Rakesh Singh Rana, Mr Ramsharan Das, Mr Dayaram Prajapati (all SP), Mr Harpal Singh Saini (RLD), Mr Matiur Rahman (Congress) and Mr Pradeep Kumar Singh (Independent).

BJP candidates Mr Kalraj Mishra and Mr Vinay Katiyar along with industrialist Mr Sudanshu (independent) had filed their RS nominations on Thursday.

While for BSP, Mr Satish Chandra and Mr Moon Kadh filed their nominations for the RS seats, Mr Babu Singh Kushawaha, Mr Jugal Kishore and Mr Sunil Kumar had submitted their nominations for the LC seats.

In Maharashtra, the nomination of independent candidate Bharatlal Bhatia, who did not have the signatures of a proposer and seconder on his form, was rejected in the scrutiny.

The nominations of Union Power Minister Sushilkumar Shinde, Mr Rajiv Shukla (Cong), Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel, Mr Vasant Chavan (NCP), former Lok Sabha Speaker Manohar Joshi (Shiv Sena) and Prof Bal Apte (BJP) were found to be valid.

MORE UNI TEAM MA RA BS2032