Bengaluru, May 30: Congress leader and former Union minister Jairam Ramesh and Mansoor Ali Khan on Monday filed their nomination papers for the June 10 Rajya Sabha elections from Karnataka. They were accompanied to the Karnataka Assembly Secretariat by former chief minister Siddaramaiah, senior Congress leader M Mallikarjun Kharge and Congress state president D K Shivakumar.

Ramesh was the member of the Upper House from Karnataka from 2016, and the party has renominated him. The opposition party is expected to win at least one seat given its strength in the assembly but it fielded another candidate, Mansoor Ali Khan. The JD(S), which on its own strength cannot win any seat, has decided to field Kupendra Reddy.

"By fielding Khan, the Congress has put the JD(S) in a spot by testing its secular credentials," a Congress office-bearer said. He said if the JD(S) refuses to support Khan, it will send across a wrong message among the Muslim voters that the party is not as secular as it claims to be. Rajya Sabha Elections 2022: P Chidambaram Files Nomination As Congress Candidate From Tamil Nadu.

The division of 'secular votes' benefiting the BJP will "expose" the JD(S) before the minorities, according to the Congress office-bearer. The BJP has not yet revealed its cards yet regarding its third candidate and has announced fielding Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and actor-turned-politician Jaggesh, as the party is sure about winning two seats.

However, party insiders said the BJP is also weighing the option of renominating K C Ramamurthy. The elections to four seats in Rajya Sabha is necessitated as the term of office of members -- Sitharaman and K C Ramamurthy of BJP, and Jairam Ramesh is due to expire on June 30. The fourth RS member, Congress' Oscar Fernandes died last year.

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