MUMBAI: After seven years, BJP state politician Vinod Tawde is all set to return to electoral politics. Tawde, who was left out of Maharashtra politics in 2019 and was subsequently appointed general secretary of the party in New Delhi, was on Wednesday named one of the four candidates of the Maharashtra BJP for the March 16 Rajya Sabha elections.The other three in the list of candidates released by the BJP’s central election committee are its ally Ramdas Athawale of the RPI(A), currently Union minister of state for social welfare; Maya Ivnate, former mayor of Nagpur and acting corporator; and Ramrao Wadkute, who joined the BJP in 2019 and is from the Dhangar community.Political observers said Tawde has been rewarded for the BJP’s performance in the 2025 Bihar assembly elections, where it had been appointed as the party-in-charge. The BJP emerged as the largest party in Bihar, winning 89 of the state’s 243 seats.Tawde, who rose steadily in the BJP Mumbai unit from president to leader of the opposition in the legislative council, saw his fortunes decline in 2019 when he was denied a ticket to contest that year’s assembly elections. In his first term as an MLA (2014-2019), he was elected from Borivli, a BJP stronghold. In 2019 he was replaced by Sunil Rane, a close aide of CM Devendra Fadnavis. Tawde was also a minister in the first Fadnavis-led government.During the 2024 assembly elections, there was again talk that Tawde might return to state politics. However, he was embroiled in a huge controversy on the eve of the elections, when Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi workers detained him at a Vasai hotel and accused him of distributing cash. However, the Hitendra Thakur-led VBA lost all the assembly seats in the Vasai-Virar belt.Observers said the BJP recognized Tawde’s talent for political strategy and put him in charge of five states that went to polls in 2022: Goa, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and Manipur. Except for Punjab, the party won in all other states.Now, after Bihar, he has been put in charge of the Kerala assembly elections.Seven Rajya Sabha seats from Maharashtra will fall vacant in April. With over 230 MLAs in the assembly, the BJP-led Mahayuti is in a position to ensure the election of its six candidates.While the BJP is filing nominations for four seats, the other two nominations will be filed by Shiv Sena and NCP candidates, who had not announced their names till Wednesday evening. Thursday is the last day to submit nominations.Tawde expressed his gratitude to his party leadership and said he is committed to “discharge this new responsibility with full dedication and loyalty.”