Minister Babul Supriyo, actor Koel Mallick, senior advocate Menaka Guruswamy, and former Bengal DGP Rajeev Kumar were named by the Trinamool Congress on Friday night as candidates for the next Rajya Sabha elections.
The announcement was posted on X by the TMC.
On March 16, the Election Commission announced that voting would take place for 37 Rajya Sabha seats in several states, including West Bengal.We are happy to declare Babul Supriyo, Rajeev Kumar, Menaka Guruswamy, and Koel Mallick as the candidates for the next Rajya Sabha elections. We send them our sincere congratulations and best wishes," the TMC wrote on X."May they continue to uphold Trinamool's enduring legacy of resilience and its unwavering commitment to safeguarding the rights and dignity of every Indian," it read.
The TMC held four of the five Rajya Sabha seats from West Bengal that will become vacant in 2026.The opposition BJP is predicted to win one of the five Rajya Sabha seats from West Bengal, while the ruling TMC is projected to win four of them due to the assembly's strong numerical advantage in the 294-member body.
With the assembly's present math, the result seems almost certain unless any party nominates a second candidate, which would start a contest and add more political drama only weeks before West Bengal's assembly election campaign begins

After being excluded from the Union Council of Ministers, Supriyo, a former Union minister in the Narendra Modi administration, left the BJP and joined the TMC in September 2021. On a TMC ticket, he went on to win the Ballygunge Assembly by-election and is now a minister in the West Bengal administration.
His selection is perceived as a reward for his continuing involvement in state governance and political repositioning.
A former member of the Indian Police Service, Kumar led the Kolkata Police before serving as the Director General of Police for West Bengal. During the investigation into the Saradha chit fund case, he was also at the center of a high-profile conflict between the West Bengal government and central agencies..In the historic constitutional case that resulted in the decriminalization of homosexuality in India through the reading down of Section 377 of the IPC in 2018, Guruswamy, a senior advocate of the Supreme Court, was one of the attorneys defending petitioners.
The daughter of seasoned actor Ranjit Mallick, Mallick is a well-known performer in the Bengali cinema industry. Her nomination is thought to be a component of the TMC's plan to field prominent members of the public in the Upper House.
The TMC seems to be strengthening its broad-based social alliance and bolstering its power in Parliament by putting forth candidates from a variety of backgrounds.