Bihar Deputy Chief Ministers Samrat Chaudhary, left, Vijay Kumar Sinha, right, and others greet BJP President Nitin Nabin after the NDA swept all five Bihar seats in the Rajya Sabha elections, in Patna, on March 16, 2026.
| Photo Credit: PTI
All five candidates of National Democratic Alliance (NDA) on Monday (March 16, 2026) secured victory in the biennial election to the Rajya Sabha after four MLAs of Mahagathbandhan did not turn up for the voting.
All 202 MLAs of the NDA cast their votes, whereas only 37 MLAs from the Mahagathbandhan voted.
The five candidates who secured victory, two each from Bharatiya Janata Party and Janata Dal-(United), included BJP’s President Nitin Nabin and Shivesh Kumar, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and Ramnath Thakur. Rashtriya Lok Morcha (RLM) President and former Union Minister Upendra Kushwaha also secured victory.
Out of six, three Congress MLAs who skipped the voting were Manohar Prasad Singh (Manihari), Surendra Prasad (Valimikinagar) and Manoj Bishwas (Forbesganj). Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) MLA from Dhaka Assembly constituency Faisal Rahman also skipped the voting.
There was a contest for the fifth seat between Shivesh Kumar and Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) candidate Amarendra Dhari Singh. As per the calculation, there was a requirement of 41 votes to win a seat, from the NDA side, Mr. Shivesh got 38 votes whereas Mr.Singh got 37 votes.
Sharing the information, Bihar BJP State President Sanjay Saraogi, “All our five candidates have secured the victory. I congratulate everyone.”
According to the Assembly Secretariat, Nitish Kumar and Nitin Nabin each secured 44 votes whereas Ramnath Thakur and Upendra Kushwaha each got 42 votes. In the first preference round, BJP candidate Shivesh Ram received 30 votes.
Rajya Sabha follows a system called the Proportional Representation by means of a Single Transferable Vote (STV).
In this system, instead of voting for just a single candidate, MLAs get a ballot paper with the names of all the candidates. They must then rank them in order of their preference, i.e. first choice, second choice and so on.
A candidate doesn’t need the most votes to win. They just need to reach a specific “quota”. This number is calculated based on the total number of MLAs voting and the number of seats available.
If a winner gets more votes than the quota, their votes are transferred to the “second choice.”
This is what happened when Shivesh Kumar defeated the RJD’s candidate Mr. Singh in second choice.
Reacting to the victory, BJP leader and Deputy Chief Minister Vijay Kumar Sinha launched a scathing attack on RJD and Congress, saying that both parties are insulting democratic values.
He alleged that keeping legislators locked up in a hotel is similar to treating them as “bonded laborers”. Mr. Sinha asserted that not trusting their own colleagues and keeping them in captivity is part of RJD’s old political culture.
Rashtriya Lok Morcha (RLM) President Upendra Kushwaha also took a dig at the RJD over its MLA skipping the voting.
“You will find, after some time, the entire RJD party will vanish,”Mr. Kushwaha said.
Bihar Congress President Rajesh Ram accused BJP of using the investigating agencies against its three MLAs due to which they did not turn up to vote.
RJD MLA Kumar Sarvjeet alleged that BJP used the money power to win the election.
Published – March 17, 2026 02:09 am IST
