The ruling National Conference on Friday won three of the four Rajya Sabha seats from Jammu and Kashmir, its outreach to INDIA allies failing to deliver the expected clean sweep.

The BJP won the fourth seat, aided apparently by cross-voting from some INDIA members or Independents who had pledged support to the ruling party.

BJP candidate Sat Sharma secured 32 votes although the party has only 28 MLAs, and no other legislator had publicly offered support to it.

A fuming chief minister, Omar Abdullah, alleged sabotage by non-NC members.

“All of @JKNC_ votes remained intact across the four elections, as witnessed by our election agent who saw each polling slip. There was no cross-voting from any of our MLAs so the questions arise — where did the 4 extra votes of the BJP come from?” Omar asked on X.

About those who allegedly cross-voted, he wrote: “Do they have the guts to put their hands up and own up to helping the BJP after promising us their votes? What pressure or inducement helped them make this choice? Let’s see if any of the BJP’s secret team own up to selling their souls!”

A senior NC leader told The Telegraph: “Our success in three seats was assured on the basis of our own strength and support from some Independents. We needed the support of the Congress, PDP and some other candidates to sail through in the fourth. We did not get the support....”

An official said there was a joint notification for the third and fourth seats.

“In all, 87 MLAs voted. With 28 MLAs, the BJP was unlikely to win as two NC candidates (in theory) jointly enjoyed the support of 59 MLAs,” he said.

“They would have both won if each got half these votes. While one NC candidate got 31, the other got just 22.”

While Sharma won 32 votes, the NC’s Shammi Oberoi received 31. Both won. The NC’s Imran Nabi Dar polled just 22 votes. Two votes were found invalid.

The two other NC candidates, who won comfortably, were Choudhary Mohammad Ramzan and Sajad Kichloo.

Peoples Conference leader Sajad Lone, the only MLA to abstain, alleged a “fixed match” between the NC and the BJP.

“Why did NC poll extra votes for candidate 3 (Shammi Oberoi). They didn’t need to. They polled 31 votes for candidate 3. Only 29 votes would have sufficed. Even 28. Because BJP was fighting for seat 4,” he posted.

“Who cross voted. Whose votes were rejected. And who was hand in glove?”

The election was hotly contested, as evident from BJP member Chander Prakash Ganga casting his vote before immediately leaving for Jammu, where his wife had passed away.

Jailed MLA Mehraj Malik, from the Aam Aadmi Party, voted through a postal ballot.

The NC and BJP workers celebrated separately.

This was the first Rajya Sabha election in Jammu and Kashmir since the abrogation of Article 370 in 2019.

In the run-up to the election, the Congress and the PDP had reluctantly offered their support to the NC, that too after airing several complaints about the ruling party’s political conduct.