Congress Urges Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren To Probe INDIA Bloc’s Rajya Sabha Poll Defeat
Congress says it's time for the bloc to introspect its Rajya Sabha poll defeat in Jharkhand based on facts and not indulge in blame games.
Published : June 21, 2026 at 6:30 PM IST
New Delhi: The Congress has urged its ally and Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren to probe into the reasons behind the defeat of the INDIA bloc’s second candidate Pranav Jha in the recent Rajya Sabha elections.
“The Chief Minister is the head of the INDIA bloc in Jharkhand. The bloc had fielded two candidates and had the required numbers to ensure their win. Therefore, we have urged the chief minister to look into the reasons why the bloc's second candidate lost and clear the air around the issue,” AICC in-charge of Jharkhand K Raju told ETV Bharat.
The Congress and JMM, which are part of the ruling INDIA bloc in Jharkhand, had put up two candidates for the June 18 Rajya Sabha elections - Baidyanath Ram of JMM and Pranav Jha of Congress. The RJD and the CPI(ML) are the other two allies of the bloc.
Ram won his seat comfortably with 30 votes but Jha who got 20 votes lost the key poll, following which the Congress Jharkhand in-charge K Raju alleged that 4 RJD MLAs and 2 CPI(ML) MLAs cross-voted leading to the defeat of Jha and the victory of BJP-backed independent Parimal Nathwani, who got 28 votes. The Congress candidate, he said got 16 votes of its own MLAs and 4 votes from JMM MLAs.
Both the RJD and CPI(ML) hit back at the grand old party saying the Congress was leveling false charges against them and should rather look within for any problem. The issue created friction within the ruling alliance forcing the top Congress leadership to get in touch with the allies as the BJP made fun of the bloc.
“The allegations against our MLAs are baseless and unfortunate. All the 16 Congress MLAs voted for Jha. The entire Congress legislature party is united. The INDIA bloc had 56 votes and should have won both the seats but got 6 votes less. This is the number that helped independent Nathwani win,” said Raju.
“I had personally checked the ballot papers of our MLAs as I was the polling agent for Jha as well. Win or loss is part of democracy but to question the integrity of Congress MLAs without any proof is not good,” he said.
The defeat of the Congress candidate came as a setback for the bloc which had worked out a joint strategy to win both the Rajya Sabha seats in the state. After Raju had a detailed meeting with the Chief Minister, AICC observer for the Rajya Sabha polls and former Chhattisgarh Chief Minister, Bhupesh Baghel, too had met Soren to ensure the win of the bloc candidates.
On his part, Congress nominee Jha had met all the alliance partners separately to enlist their support. He had made a special request to RJD leader Tejaswi Yadav to get the support of his four Jharkhand MLAs.
“The defeat of the Congress candidate is not only cheating against the bloc but against the Chief Minister as well. The BJP and its allies had only 24 votes but where did they get the additional 6 votes from? The Chief Minister heads the INDIA bloc and was confident of the win of both the candidates. We hope he will probe the poll fraud and take action against the guilty,” said Raju.
Congress insiders said as the top leaders of the INDIA bloc were discussing and analysing the matter, the allies should avoid blaming each other over the fraud in the RS polls.
“Every leader, every pollster and every poll watcher knows what has happened in the Jharkhand Rajya Sabha polls on the ground. The BJP’s infamous ‘suitcase’ politics has resurfaced in the state politics. They had earlier tried to topple the bloc government in its first tenure when Chief Minister Soren faced false charges and was put in jail. But we were able to counter them together. The Congress-JMM alliance is solid in the state. The need of the hour is to introspect based on facts and focus on pro-people politics,” AICC secretary in-charge of Jharkhand Sirivella Prasad told ETV Bharat.
“The BJP has to answer why it could not field a local leader for the Rajya Sabha elections and had to depend on an outsider who contested as an independent. It is obvious that money power played a role in his win and this episode has hurt the local pride,” he said.
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