The Rajya Sabha elections were held on 23 of March to fill the vacancies that will arise after 58 members of the upper house retire early next month. This time, the Rajya Sabha elections were held to elect members from 16 states. Rajya Sabha has a total of 245 seats and 126 seats are needed for a majority in the house. The BJP that had 58 members, four more than the Congress, was expected to better its tally as it rules 11 of the 16 states where Rajya Sabha elections  were held. Members of state assemblies elect Rajya Sabha members by a process of indirect voting in what is called proportional representation with a single transferable vote. Let’s look at the results of Rajya Sabha elections 2018 and try to understand how these results will effect indian politics.

Read more: What Is The Role Of Rajya Sabha As An Upper House In Our Legislature?

Results of Rajya Sabha elections 2018 –

Here’s the complete list of the states and the number of vacancies that were filled.

• Uttar Pradesh,10 seats.
• Maharashtra,6 seats.
• Bihar,6 seats.
• West Bengal,5 seats.
• Madhya Pradesh,5 seats.
• Gujrat,4 seats.
• Karnataka,4 seats.
• Andhra Pradesh,3 seats.
• Telangana,3 seats.
• Rajasthan,3 seats.
• Odisha,3 seats.
• Jharkhand,2 seats.
• Chhattisgarh,1 seat.
• Haryana,1 seat.
• Himachal Pradesh,1 seat.
• Uttarakhand,1 seat.

Party wise analysis of recently declared Rajya Sabha elections 2018 – 

The results: The BJP on Friday tasted sweet victory after it was able to defeat its opposition by ensuring victory for all of its nine candidates, days after it lost two crucial seats in the Lok Sabha by-polls in the state.

The remaining seat went to the Samajwadi Party which led to the defeat of the BSP candidate in the prestigeous battle of ballots, touted as a test for the new-found alliance between the parties headed by Akhilesh Yadav and Mayawati.

Bharatiya Janata Party:

The BJP, which earlier held 54 seats in the Rajya Sabha has now increased its standing to 69 seats in the House. Among the 58 outgoing parliamentarians, for which the Rajya Sabha polls were held, 17 are from the BJP.

The BJP members who won eight seats with ease are Union finance minister Arun Jaitley, Ashok Bajpai, Vijay Pal Singh Tomar, Sakal Deep Rajbhar, Kanta Kardam, Anil Jain, Harnath Singh Yadav and GVL Narasimha Rao. The ninth candidate, businessman Anil Kumar Agarwal, was backed by the BJP and defeated BSP’s Bhimrao Ambedkar.

Read more: Why Did BJP Lose UP Bypolls 2018?

The party’s Saroj Pandey won  the lone Rajya Sabha seat from Chhattisgarh, while Sameer Uranv emerged victorious in Jharkhand. The BJP also secured one seat in Karnataka with Rajeev Chandrasekhar’s win.

Indian National Congress:

The Congress’s numbers in the Upper House decreased to 50 seats from the earlier 54. Five Congress members were elected unopposed on 15 March with the other five having contested in Friday’s polls across five states. Among the 58 outgoing parliamentarians, 14 are from the Congress.

Trinamool Congress:

The TMC bagged four Rajya Sabha seats in West Bengal taking its total seats in the House to 13 from the previous 12. Out of the 58 parliamentarians retiring soon, three are from TMC — Kunal Kumar Ghosh, Vivek Gupta and Mohammed Nadimul Haque — whose term ends on 2 April, 2018, according to the RS official website. According to election officials, Trinamool’s Chakraborty secured the highest number of 54 votes. Haque and Biswas got 52 votes each and Sen 51.

Samajwadi Party:

With three party members completing their Rajya Sabha terms on 2 April, 2018, the Akhilesh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party won just one seat where they fielded Jaya Bachchan. This decreased its count in the Upper House to 16 seats.

Bahujan Samaj Party:

The Mayawati-led BSP’s seat share in the House remains unchanged at five. However, the party fielded Bhimrao Ambedkar in Uttar Pradesh, who lost to BJP-backed Independent candidate Anil Kumar Agarwal.

Telangana Rashtra Samiti:

Telangana’s ruling TRS bagged all three Rajya Sabha seats. B Prakash, J Santosh Kumar and AB Lingaiah Yadav were elected to the Upper House. This doubles TRS’ strength in the Rajya Sabha, from three to six seats.

The opposition parties all made all the due efforts to ensure that their MLA vote in favour of the candidates fielded by the SP and the BSP. The BJP suffered a stunning defeat in  Gorakhpur and Phulpur after the Bahujan Samaj Party joined hands with the Samajwadi Party. However, even after all these efforts, BJP won all the 9 Rajya Sabha seats it contested ensuring a stunning victory.