Nominations of all six candidates for RS poll in Bengal accepted

The nominations of all six candidates for the Rajya election from West Bengal, including Trinamool Congress-backed Congress nominee Abhishek Manu Singhvi, have been accepted on Tuesday, a senior state assembly official said here.

All the documents submitted by the Rajya Sabha candidates were found valid after scrutiny.

"All the nomination papers are in order and have been accepted," the official said.

Subhasish Chakraborty, Abir Biswas, Santanu Sen and Nadimul Haque from the Trinamool, and Communist Party of India-Marxist's Rabin Deb were the others who filed their nomination on Monday in the assembly, making a contest inevitable in case none of these candidates opts out.

Singhvi's nomination had 40 proposers -- 20 each from the Congress and the Trinamool. After completing the formalities, he called for preventing any division in the anti-BJP votes in the country in order to "stop the march of divisive forces".

West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool supremo Mamata Banerjee has announced her party support for Singhvi.

The election to the five Rajya Sabha seats from the state will be held on March 23, which has become necessary as the terms of Kunal Ghosh, Vivek Gupta, and Nadimul Haque of the Trinamool Congress and Tapan Sen of CPI-M will end on April 2.

Mukul Roy, who left the Trinamool last year and joined the BJP, has resigned from the upper house of Parliament.

--IANS

mgr/vd