The NDA has secured its victory in all five Rajya Sabha seats in Bihar thanks to the landslide wins of BJP National President Nitin Nabin and Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. Their three candidates have also been declared to win in Odisha. In the meantime, separate objections have been filed by the Congress and the BJP in Haryana.
BJP National President Nitin Nabin being felicitated by Bihar Legislative Assembly Speaker Prem Kumar, as he casts his vote on the occasion of Rajya Sabha elections, in Patna on March 16, 2026. Bihar Dy CMs Vijay Sinha and Samrat Chaudhary also present. Photo: @NitinNabin X/ANI Photo
The NDA won every Rajya Sabha seat that was up for election on Monday, March 16, 2026—five in Bihar, three in Odisha, and one in Haryana. Following separate objections from the Congress and the BJP, vote counting for two seats in Haryana was postponed.
Rajya Sabha Election on March 16, 2026
Only 11 of the Rajya Sabha’s 37 seats were up for election in Bihar, Odisha, and Haryana because the other members had previously been chosen without opposition.
The Biju Janata Dal only won one seat in Odisha because to extensive “cross-voting,” while the BJP won three seats, including Dilip Ray, an independent candidate supported by the party and a hotelier.
With the support of their respective party lawmakers, state BJP President Manmohan Samal, incumbent BJP MP Sujit Kumar, and BJD candidate Santrupta Mishra all won handily. Mr. Roy and Datteswar Roy were expected to compete fiercely; notably, Datteswar Roy was supported by both the Congress and the Communist Party of India (Marxist).
But in the end, the fight was essentially one-sided since many lawmakers from both the Congress and the BJD disobeyed party orders to vote for Mr. Roy, one of the BJD’s founding members. Eleven lawmakers in all, three from the Congress and eight from the BJD, disobeyed party directives by casting a cross-vote for a different candidate.
Mr. Ray won an amazing victory in the Odisha Assembly despite not having the necessary number of members.
Allegations by the BJP and Congress
After the BJP and Congress filed separate complaints, the vote-counting process in Haryana, where elections were being held for two Rajya Sabha seats, was suspended. Sanjay Bhatia of the BJP and Karamvir Singh Bhaudh of the Congress were proclaimed the winners of the election amid a flurry of dramatic events around claims of a breach of vote secrecy and intense public curiosity.
At a late-night press conference, Haryana Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini congratulated the two winning leaders on their victory.
“The Election Commission (EC) must immediately thwart and remedy this; a clear attempt is being made to interfere with the integrity of the elections,” Mr. Kharge wrote in the letter. However, since this is obviously a malevolent attempt to taint the democratic process, the ballots cast by legitimate voters cannot be deemed void under any circumstances.
For its side, the BJP filed two complaints, one of which was about a breach of confidentiality and involved the voting of two Congress MLAs, Paramvir Singh from Tohana and Bharat Singh Beniwal from Ellenabad. On the other hand, the Congress party complained to the Returning Officer about Cabinet Minister Anil Vij’s alleged violation of vote secrecy.
Eighty-eight of the ninety members of the Haryana Legislative Assembly exercised their right to vote. Arjun Chautala and Aditya Devi Lal, two MLAs from the Indian National Lok Dal (INLD), did not cast ballots. The number of votes needed to win decreased to 30 after 88 votes were cast.
Three people are running for the two Rajya Sabha seats that are open in Haryana. The BJP nominated Sanjay Bhatia, while the Congress party fielded Karmavir Singh Boudh. Satish Nandal, an Independent, was the third contender.
In the 90-member Haryana Assembly, the ruling BJP has 48 MLAs, the Congress has 37, the INLD has two, and three lawmakers are Independents.
MLAs of the Grand Alliance abstained from the Rajya Sabha vote.
The National Democratic Alliance (NDA) has won all five of the Rajya Sabha seats that were up for election in Bihar. But even with the backing of the BSP and Asaduddin Owaisi’s AIMIM, the Mahagathbandhan was unable to secure the necessary 41 votes.
This occurred as a result of one RJD MLA and three Congress MLAs failing to show up to vote.
Three Congress MLAs and one RJD MLA did not turn up to vote.
This MLA are ,
Manoj Bishwas
Forbesganj’s first-ever MLA, Manoj Biswas, won his seat in the Legislative Assembly by a mere 221 votes. His political party affiliation has changed over the last few years: in 2019, he was the Block President of the JD(U); later, he joined the RJD; and this time, he ran for Congress and was elected.
Faisal Rahman
He is a first-time elected lawmaker and the son of former MP Matiur Rahman. In the ‘Dhaka’ constituency, he defeated Pawan Jaiswal of the BJP by a margin of 178 votes. His father had held a number of positions in the Congress and RJD parties. Rahman is recognized as a close friend of a JD(U) lawmaker in the present Legislative Assembly.
Manohar Prasad Singh
For the fourth time, Manohar Prasad Singh has been elected to the Manihari seat. He was initially elected on a JD(U) ticket and is a member of the Scheduled Tribes community. At Nitish Kumar’s request, he changed parties when the ‘Mahagathbandhan’ was created in 2015 and the Congress was given the seat. He ran on the ticket of the new party and is still a Congress MLA.
Surendra Prasad Kushwaha
He was elected as a first-time MLA from Bihar’s Valmiki Nagar. He ran for office in 2015 with a ticket from the “Rashtriya Lok Samata Party” (RLSP), which is led by Upendra Kushwaha. Rinku Singh, an independent, defeated him in that election.
Later, Surendra Kushwaha joined the Congress and Rinku joined the JD(U). He defeated the JD(U) candidate by 1,675 votes in the 2020 election. But ever since, he had been trying to get into the NDA camp.
Alok Singh, the State President of Upendra Kushwaha’s new party, the “Rashtriya Lok Morcha” (RLM), met with him during the Rajya Sabha elections. Additionally, Surendra Kushwaha is a member of the Bihar Legislative Assembly’s “Petitions Committee.”