Three former Rajya Sabha MPs, Sukhendu Sekhar Roy, Sushmita Dev and Prakash Chik Baraik, who were all elected on TMC tickets, have been named as BJP's official candidates for the upcoming Rajya Sabha by-elections in West Bengal to be held on July 24, 2026. Roy and Baraik's were due till September 2029, while Dev was to continue till April 2030.
While regular biennial elections have a proportional voting system, allowing minority parties to win a share of the seats in the Rajya Sabha. But in bypolls, there will be three separate ballot boxes and three separate voting processes; the candidate with 50 per cent +1 majority is likely to land the seats. While the BJP is the clear favourite to win these polls with a commanding majority of 207 seats out of the 294 seats.
The announcement came just hours after the three TMC candidates formally joined the Bharatiya Janata Party at its state headquarters in Salt Lake, Kolkata. They were welcomed into the party by State BJP president Samik Bhattacharya. The induction marks a shift from the BJP's post-assembly position on admitting TMC leaders into the party. The BJP President called the induction an “exception”, saying that their experience will improve the BJP's position in the state. This was consistent with the party's earlier stand of accommodating “untainted” leaders from the ruling party, a position that had drawn criticism from the party's senior leaders like Dilip Ghosh.
"Everyone has a past. Their only identity now is that they are BJP workers," said President Samik Bhattacharya.
The government is likely to reintroduce the constitutional amendments to advance Women's Reservation, along with the Delimitation Bill and the One Nation One Election, in the Monsoon Session of the parliament starting on July 20. Winning these three seats will raise the BJP’s individual tally in the Upper House from 114 to 117, while the total strength of the BJP-led NDA reaches 154 seats, just 10 short of a two-thirds majority required for a constitutional amendment.
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