Gujarat Rajya Sabha Polls: BJP bags 3 out of 4 seats

New Delhi, June 19: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has bagged 3 out of 4 Rajya Sabha seats up for grabs in Gujarat, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's home state. BJP's Narhari Amin, Abhay Bhardwaj, Ramilaben Bara registered victory while Shaktisingh Gohil was lone Congress candidate to secure victory.

The counting was delayed due to objections raised by the Congress demanding that votes cast by two BJP MLAs be invalidated. The Election Commission rejected the demand, upholding the report given by the election observer.

Former Union minister Bharatsinh Solanki, a second candidate fielded by the Congress, lost.

"Our candidates Abhay Bharadwaj and Ramilaben Bara got 36 votes each and third candidate Amin got 32 votes in first preference and after addition of second preference votes his total came to 35.98 votes," said Deputy Chief Minister Nitin Patel. "Gohil of Congress got 36 votes and Solanki got 30 votes plus some 1.99 second preference votes which added up to 31.9. So Solanki lost."

No votes were invalidated by the Election Commission, the BJP leader added.

Voting began at 9 am and continued till 4 pm. 170 out of 172 MLAs exercised their franchise. Two Bharatiya Tribal Party MLAs did not turn up to vote.