Sonia Gandhi submits her Rajasthani candidacy for the RS elections

Delhi, New: Sonia Gandhi, the head of the Congress parliamentary party, has decided not to run for the Lok Sabha this year. In Jaipur, Rajasthan, on Wednesday, she submitted her nomination papers for the Rajya Sabha, twenty-five years after her first tenure in the Lower House of Parliament.

After assuming the role of Congress president in 1999, Mrs. Gandhi was first elected as a member of parliament, representing Rae Bareli in the Lok Sabha. When former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s tenure ends in April, the seat in Rajasthan will become vacant.

Ajay Maken, the party treasurer, is running from Karnataka, while Abhishek Singhvi is running from Himachal Pradesh. Himachal Pradesh and Karnataka are both ruled by the Congress party.

Last year, Mr. Maken ran an unsuccessful campaign in the Haryana Rajya Sabha elections.

State Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu said that Mr. Singhvi would present his candidacy on Thursday for the only Rajya Sabha seat from Himachal Pradesh. Anand Sharma, a senior party leader and former Union minister, was also vying for a seat in the Rajya Sabha from his native state of Himachal Pradesh.

Renuka Chowdhury, a former Union minister, and M. Anil Kumar Yadav, a local politician from Telangana, the southern state where the party took power in December, were both nominated by the Congress for the Rajya Sabha.

Syed Naseer Hussain, a coordinator in Mallikarjun Kharge’s office, was also renominated by the Congress. Mr. Hussain will be serving his second term as a Karnataka representative in the Rajya Sabha.

Akhilesh Prasad Singh, the state leader of the party’s Bihar section, has also been renominated, according to a release. On Tuesday, he submitted his nomination.

In the list released on Wednesday, the party has also renominated G.C. Chandrasekhar, the Karnataka leader of the Congress.

The party has put forth local leader Ashok Singh from Madhya Pradesh. It has declared Maharashtra’s Chandrakant Handore as its candidate.

On February 27, there will be the biannual elections for the Rajya Sabha, which will elect 56 members. Nominations must be submitted by February 15th.