CHANDIGARH: Putting all speculations to rest, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Sunday announced former Haryana transport and jails minister from Panipat, Krishan Lal Panwar, as its candidate for the Rajya Sabha seat of the party.
The Congress too is expected to announce its candidate on Monday. Tuesday is the last day of filing of nomination papers for the two seats of Rajya Sabha which will fall vacant as BJP's Dushyant Gautam and party-supported Subhash Chandra are retiring.
Haryana BJP president Om Parkash Dhankar, senior BJP leader Capt Abhimanyu and a couple of national leaders of the BJP were said to be in reckoning of the party high command.
Panwar was among the 16 candidates whose names were cleared by the BJP's central office on Sunday. 64-year-old Panwar comes from Israna assembly constituency.
He first made it to Haryana assembly in 2009 and then he joined BJP ahead of 2014 elections and was re-elected.
He remained the jails, transport and urban local bodies minister in Khattar's first term between the year 2014 to 2019. However, he had lost the assembly elections in 2019 to Balbir Singh.
