LUCKNOW: All five candidates of the ruling Samajwadi Party on Tuesday won the biennial elections to the Rajya Sabha from Uttar Pradesh, while Bharatiya Janata Party stalwarts Kalraj Mishra and Vinay Katiyar were re-elected.

Jagran group CMD and CEO of Channel 7 Mahendra Mohan Gupta, traders' leader Banwari Lal Kanchal and former U.P. Advocate-General Virendra Bhatia (all SP) made their maiden entry into the Rajya Sabha. Veteran SP leader Janeshwar Mishra was also re-elected.

The election saw as many as 15 members cross-voting, BSP being the gainer with its candidates managing maximum votes. Samajwadi Party- supported Maulana Mahmood Madni (RLD) also got the nod.

Others to romp home are Veerpal Singh Yadav (SP), Monkhad Ali and Balihari (BSP).

Out of 13 candidates in fray, the lone Congress candidate, Azad Kumar Kardam, Satish Chandra (BSP) and Industrialist Sudhanshu Mittal (Independent), a rather surprise candidate, were eliminated as they could not muster a minimum of 18 votes required as the first preference votes.

Earlier, the counting for the Rajya Sabha polls was delayed by one-and-half-hours following complaints of rigging against the ruling the SP by the Congress and the BJP.

Meanwhile, the election to the U.P. Legislative Council also concluded with 13 candidates -- six from SP, three each from BSP, BJP and one from RLD -- getting elected to the Upper House.

The elected candidates include Naresh Chandra Uttam, Khawaja Halim, Kashinath, Rakesh Singh Rana, Ramsharan Das, Dayaram Prajapati (all SP), Harpal Singh Saini (RLD), Ramapati Ram Tripathi, Ashok Dhawan, Ramnaresh Rawat (all BJP), Babu Singh Kushawaha, Jugal Kishore and Sunil Kumar (all BSP). Matiur Rahman from Congress was the only candidate to be eliminated. There was no complaint of cross-voting in the Legislative Council polls as it was secret polling.

``BJP will certainly take action against the erring MLAs and move disqualification petition against them,'' Mr Mishra said. Congress Legislature Party Leader Pramod Tiwari also maintained that cross-voting was the highlight of the polls and charged the ruling party for using force to gain support for their candidates. UNI

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