Voting for 37 Rajya Sabha seats on 16th March, nominations to be filed by 5th

The Election Commission has announced the schedule for elections to 37 seats of the Rajya Sabha, with polling set for March 16. The elections are being held as the terms of several sitting members, including senior leaders such as Sharad Pawar and Deputy Chairman Harivansh Narayan Singh, are due to expire in early April.

According to the notified programme, the election notification will be issued on February 26. Candidates can file their nominations until March 5, followed by scrutiny on March 6. The deadline for withdrawal of nominations is March 9. Voting will be held on March 16 between 9 am and 4 pm, with counting scheduled for 5 pm the same day. The entire election process will conclude by March 20.

The 37 seats are spread across 13 states. Maharashtra will see elections for seven seats, while Tamil Nadu and Bihar will have six and five seats respectively. Five seats will also be contested in West Bengal, four in Odisha, three in Assam, two each in Chhattisgarh, Haryana and Telangana, and one seat in Himachal Pradesh.

Several prominent members are completing their terms in April 2026. In West Bengal, the outgoing members include Saket Gokhale, Ritabrata Banerjee, Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya, Subrata Bakshi and Mausam Noor. In Bihar, terms are ending for Amarendra Dhari Singh, Prem Chand Gupta, Ramnath Thakur, Upendra Kushwaha and Harivansh Narayan Singh, making the upcoming elections politically significant for multiple parties.