6 candidates declared elected unopposed for Rajya Sabha

CHENNAI: State Assembly Secretary K Srinivasan on Friday announced that six candidates from Tamil Nadu S Kalyanasundaram, R Girirajan, KRN Rajesh Kumar (all three from DMK), former P Chidambaram from Congress, former Law Minister C Ve Shanmugam, R Dharmar from AIADMK were elected unopposed.

"All the six candidates, whose nominations were accepted after the scrutiny done on June 1 were accepted. No nominations were withdrawn and all of them elected unopposed according to Section 53 (2) of Representation of People Act, 1951,” said Srinivasan, while addressing the media.

For a total of six seats, 13 candidates filed 18 nominations. DMK candidates filed two nominations each, Chidambaram filed 3 nominations and AIADMK candidates filed one nomination each.

Apart from them, seven independent candidates Agni Ramachandran, R Kandasamy, K Sundaramoorthy, S Devarajan, K Padmarajan, M Manmadan and TN Velmurugan Chozhaganar, whose nominations were rejected, filed one nomination each.

Srinivasan also said that as the tenure of three DMK MPs TKS Elangovan, RS Bharathi and KRN Rajesh Kumar and three AIADMK candidates A Navaneetha Krishnan, SR Balasubramoniyan and A Vijayakumar is set to end on June 29, this year, the nominations were accepted and finalised.

Later in the evening, victory certificates for all the six candidates were given.

The three DMK candidates were accompanied by Tourism Minister M Mathiventhan and AIADMK candidates were accompanied by their party coordinators Edappadi K Palaniswami, O Panneerselvam and former Ministers SP Velumani and P Thangamani. However, for Chidambaram, his son Karthi Chidambaram received the certificate.

All three DMK candidates after receiving the certificates met Chief Minister MK Stalin and received his blessings.

Duraisamy need not certify AIADMK: EPS

After receiving the certificate, when Edappadi K Palaniswami was asked about the comments of BJP leader VP Duraisamy, he replied that people and media know how AIADMK is working as the principal opposition party inside the State Assembly and Duraisamy need not certify AIADMK.

"Myself and O Panneerselvam are speaking inside the Assembly with data but everyone knows how BJP Legislative party leader (Nainar Nagendran) speaks inside the Assembly," said Palaniswami.