Actor Koel Mallick Files Rajya Sabha Nomination Hours After Joining BJP

Kolkata ( The Indian View Team) :

Bengali film actor Rukmini Mallick, popularly known as Koel Mallick, has submitted her nomination as the BJP candidate for the upcoming Rajya Sabha polls. West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari and the party's state president Samik Bhattacharya were present at that moment.

She joined the BJP at its state headquarters in Kolkata hours earlier, a day after the party fielded her for the polls from the same seat she had earlier resigned from.

The daughter of veteran Bengali film actor Ranjit Mallick had a short stint as a Trinamool Rajya Sabha MP from April 6 to July 16. She had resigned following the Mamata Banerjee-led party's electoral debacle in the assembly elections, triggering speculations that she would join the BJP.

Koel Mallick submitted her nomination in the office of the Assembly's principal secretary at the Vidhan Sabha Bhavan, an official said. Chief Minister Adhikari and Samik Bhattacharya, who is also a Rajya Sabha member, accompanied Mallick when she submitted her nomination papers.

Mallick's entry into the BJP and nomination to the Rajya Sabha follows a path taken by three former Trinamool leaders -- Sukhendy Sekhar Roy, Sushmita Deb and Prakash Chik Baraik -- who had earlier resigned from the Trinamool and the Upper House, crossed over to the saffron camp and were subsequently re-elected unopposed to the Rajya Sabha on BJP tickets.

Elections to 12 Rajya Sabha seats across Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, and West Bengal will be held on October 16. The BJP has a clear majority in the West Bengal Assembly.

Koel Mallick accepted the BJP flag from state general secretary Shashi Agnihotri at the party's state headquarters in Salt Lake amid chants of 'Vande Mataram' on Monday morning before proceeding to file her nomination.