Political temperatures rose in Madhya Pradesh on Tuesday after the nomination of Congress Rajya Sabha candidate Meenakshi Natarajan was rejected during scrutiny, with Chief Minister Mohan Yadav alleging the party fielded a candidate with a concealed criminal record and lacked support from its own MLAs.
“The Congress leadership realised that the MLAs were not standing by them, which is why they withheld key information from Meenakshi Natarajan’s affidavit,” Yadav said at a press conference in Bhopal after the Returning Officer cancelled Natarajan’s papers.
The rejection marks a setback for the Congress ahead of the Rajya Sabha polls and hands the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) fresh ammunition to target the opposition over candidate selection and internal unity. Yadav alleged the omission in the affidavit was deliberate and serious.
“The information deliberately withheld by the Congress candidate amounts to the offence of concealing a criminal record. In reality, if one has a pending criminal case in any court, it must be disclosed in the affidavit so that every voter is aware of all relevant details when one becomes a candidate,” he said.
The Chief Minister linked the rejection to the Congress’s legislative strength, citing the movement of party MLAs to Bengaluru. “Only 18 Congress MLAs boarded the 75-seater chartered plane; therefore, this makes it clear that the other MLAs were not with the party,” Yadav said.
He drew parallels with the 2024 Lok Sabha elections to sharpen the attack. “This conspiracy is akin to the situation where Congress Lok Sabha candidates abandoned the electoral fray in 2024. Congress should engage in introspection rather than levelling allegations against others,” he remarked.
Welcoming the Returning Officer’s decision, Yadav added: “I welcome the decision taken, specifically regarding the scrutiny phase of the entire election process. Congress should now introspect on why they field candidates with such criminal records.”
The Congress, however, strongly contested Yadav’s reading of its MLA numbers and motives. The party had earlier officially stated that 45 MLAs, accompanied by their families, had flown from Bhopal to Bengaluru, while the remaining legislators were scheduled to travel on a later evening flight.
Senior Congress leaders said the shifting of MLAs was a precautionary measure ahead of the Rajya Sabha polls, a routine practice by parties to prevent poaching. They dismissed Yadav’s remarks as “political spin” and said the low turnout on the chartered flight did not reflect the party’s actual strength or support for Natarajan.
Natarajan, a former MP and AICC secretary, was the Congress’s lone candidate from Madhya Pradesh for the Rajya Sabha. The rejection, if upheld, could leave Congress without a candidate in the fray, potentially giving the BJP a clear run for the seat.