Rajya Sabha Election 2022: Congress leader Ajay Maken loses Rajya Sabha elections in Haryana, Kartikeya Sharma wins

New delhi date. Saturday 11 June 2022

The Congress has suffered a major setback in Haryana. His senior leader Ajay Maken has lost the Rajya Sabha elections. The Congress party had earlier declared victory, but the high voltage drama that lasted till late at night made the equation so bad that independent Kartikeya Sharma reached the Rajya Sabha. Former Union Minister Vinod Sharma's son and media executive Kartikeya Sharma had the support of BJP and Jananayak Janata Party. With one vote canceled, the maths changed and Ajay Maken's dream of reaching the Rajya Sabha was shattered.

Voting for the two Rajya Sabha seats in Haryana began at 9 am on Friday. Krishna Lal Panwar of BJP has won this seat. For the second seat, there was a political tussle between Ajay Maken and Kartikeya Sharma. The counting was scheduled to begin at 5 pm on Friday after the polls, but the Election Commission complained to Jajapa's polling agent that two Congress MLAs, Kiran Chaudhary and Bibi Batra, had shown their marked ballot papers, which were incorrect as per the rules and their votes should be canceled. Independent Kartikeya Sharma's election agent also sent an affidavit to the Election Commission alleging the same. BJP, JJP and independent candidate Kartikeya Sharma also accused Returning Officer RK Nandal, who was in charge of voting, of acting in a partisan manner.

Jajpa's polling agent Digvijay Chautala, in a complaint to the Election Commission, alleged that Congress MLAs Kiran Chaudhary and Bibi Batra had shown their filled and marked ballot papers to him and other polling agents during the election. These people were not the official representatives of that party. May and other stakeholders objected to this to Returning Officer RK Nandal but he biasedly dismissed our complaints without looking at the video recorded on the official camera at the premises.

Based on the complaint, the Election Commission requested a video recording of the voting with the Returning Officer. He was investigated. After the inquiry, the commission allowed the counting of votes at about one o'clock in the night, giving them the right to vote. Counting started 8 hours late. Out of a total of 90 MLAs, one independent MLA Balraj Kundu did not vote. One vote was canceled. Thus a total of 88 valid votes survived. Returning officer RK Nandal said Pawar got 36 votes. Congress needed 30 votes to win. His vote was reduced to 29 with the cancellation of one Congress vote. Karthikeyan got 29.6 votes. Kartikeya got 23 first-priority votes and Panwar's 6.65 votes were transferred to him, bringing his total to 29.6 and he won.

But before the final results, the Congress had declared Ajay Maken the winner on Twitter, but the tweet was later deleted. Congress MLA BB Batra clarified that it was a miscommunication as it was earlier learned that Ajay Maken got 30 votes, though one vote was canceled. Now the question is whose vote was canceled. Due to which Ajay Maken had to face defeat. Congress polling agent BB Batra alleged that Kuldeep Bishnoi did not vote for the party's candidate. This caused Maken to lose. If they had voted for the Congress candidate, we would have won. On the other hand, Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal thanked the MLAs for calling the victory of Panwar and Kartikeya Sharma a victory for democracy.