Ambani files RS papers

To contest as an independent candidate supported by the Samajwadi Party.

Vice-Chairman of Reliance Industries Limited, Anil Ambani, filed nomination papers for the Rajya Sabha yesterday. Ambani will follow other industrialists to the Rajya Sabha, including KK Birla, Kamal Morarka, Vijay Mallya and RK Dhoot. Ambani will contest as an independent candidate supported by the Samajwadi Party.

The politics of fielding Ambani as an independent candidate was clear. This was the Samajwadi Party and Amar Singh's way of throwing the gauntlet of secularism before the Congress. It will be hard for the Congress to justify opposing an independent like Ambani, although, party spokesman Satyabrat Chaturvedi said at the briefing that as Ambani had not come to the Congress for support, the Congress could not help him.

Later in the night, the name of Delhi leader, Brij Mohan Bhama, was announced for UP, though it was not clear if he was going to be the party's only candidate.

But fielding Anil Ambani did expose the depth of differences between the SP and the Congress. Earlier, the Congress had been toying with the idea of fielding Salman Khurshid for the Rajya Sabha. This was also perceived to be a trap for political endorsement by the Samajwadi Party in UP.

That Khurshid has not filed his nomination yet, suggests Ambani's candidature has confused the Congress. Senior party leaders from the state, including UPCC president Jagdambika Pal, CLP leader Pramod Tiwari and Khurshid met Ahmed Patel, political secretary to the Congress chief, to discuss the party strategy on fielding a candidate in the state.

Ajit Singh has already said that his 13-member RLD will support the SP and not the Congress. There is just one day left for filing nominations.

The 45-year old Ambani is a management graduate from the Wharton school, University of Pennsylvania, US, and jointly heads the Rs 80,000 crore Reliance group with his elder brother, Mukesh.

He joined Reliance in 1983 as co-executive officer and was credited for directing Reliance in its efforts to raise over $2 billion for overseas markets with a 100-year Yankee bond issue in January, 1997.

He was also rated India's "most admired CEO" for the fifth consecutive year in the Business Baron-TNS mode opinion poll last year and was voted "MTV youth icon of the year" in September, 2003.