Chief minister Nitish Kumar with the six elected NDA candidates to the Rajya Sabha, at the Assembly on Friday. Picture by Nagendra Kumar Singh

Patna, March 23: Six NDA candidates were declared elected unopposed to the Rajya Sabha today after Ashfaque Karim, an Independent candidate backed by the RJD-LJP combine, withdrew his nomination on the last day of the formality.

Those declared elected to the Upper House were the JD(U)’s Basistha Narayan Singh, Ali Anwar, Mahendra Prasad alias King Mahendra and Anil Sahni and the BJP’s Ravi Shankar Pra-sad and Dharmendra Pradhan.

The withdrawal of nomination by Karim paved the way for the NDA to clinch all six Rajya Sabha seats, the election to which was slated to be held on March 30.

Assembly in-charge secretary-cum-returning officer Laxmikant Jha gave away the certificates to all the six victorious candidates in the presence of chief minister Nitish Kumar and his deputy, Sushil Kumar Modi.

Except JD(U)’s King Mahendra who has been elected to Rajya Sabha umpteen times, Basistha Narayan Singh, Ali Anwar, Anil Sahni were elected to the Upper House for the second time.

BJP general secretary and party chief spokesman Ravi Shankar was elected to the House for the third time. His party colleague Dharmendra Pradhan, also the general secretary, was elected for the first time.

Emerging with his winning candidates in the portico of the Assembly, Nitish congratulated all the six candidates and the opposition parties for showing maturity for a unanimous election keeping in mind the numerical strength of the Assembly.

“I also congratulate the Independent candidate (Karim) for withdrawing his nomination paper for the Rajya Sabha election, paving the way for an unanimous election. I hope all the six candidates, who do not need any introduction, would continue to represent the state’s view and interests successfully,” Nitish said.