Two for BJP and one for Congress

Bharatiya Janata Party National President Amit Shah, Information and Broadcasting Minister Smriti Irani, and senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel won Rajya Sabha seats from Gujarat on Wednesday.

The results came at the end of a night of drama that culminated in the Election Commission invalidating two ballots by Congress MLAs who had cross-voted for the BJP, giving Patel just enough votes to return to the Upper House for the fifth time.

Night of drama

After the voting on Tuesday,at 11:30 pm, after reviewing the video evidence, the EC concluded that the two rebel Congress MLAs had violated rules regarding the secrecy of ballots and declared them invalid.

Though the EC ordered counting to begin immediately afterwards, the BJP gave a further verbal complaint and attempted to stall the process. The counting of votes eventually only began late at night, stretching into the early hours of Wednesday.