Of the 57 seats, only eight are held by the Congress. The rest are divided between the BJP and the other parties. This time, the tenure of many Congress veterans, like P Chidambaram, Kapil Sibal, Jairam Ramesh and Ambika Soni are also set to end.

New Delhi: The Election Commission of India on Thursday said that polling in the 52 Rajya Sabha seats across 15 states will take place on June 10. The elections will comes barely a month before the Presidential election slated to be held in July.
The biennial polls in these seats are taking place since the members are retiring between June and August. The maximum number of seats fall in Uttar Pradesh (11) followed by Maharashtra (6) and Tamil Nadu (6).
The polling will also be held on five seats from Bihar, four each from Karnataka, Rajasthan and Andhra Pradesh, three each from Madhya Pradesh and Odisha, two each from Punjab, Jharkhand, Haryana, Chhattisgarh and Telangana and one seat from Uttarakhand.
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Of the 57 seats, only eight are held by the Congress. The rest are divided between the BJP and the other parties. This time, the tenure of many Congress veterans, like P Chidambaram, Kapil Sibal, Jairam Ramesh and Ambika Soni are also set to end.
In a statement, the EC said, “The Commission has directed that for the purpose of marking preference(s) on the ballot paper only integrated violet colour sketch pen(s) of pre-fixed specification, provided by the Returning Officer, shall be used. No other pen shall, under any circumstances, be used in the above said elections.”
It added, “Adequate measures for close monitoring of the election process by appointing observers shall be taken to ensure free and fair election.”
The Commission has also directed the Chief Secretaries concerned to depute a senior officer from the State to ensure that the extant instructions regarding COVID-19 containment measures are complied with while making arrangements for conduct of the elections, the statement by the poll panel added.