The Election Commission of India on Thursday announced that bye-polls for one Rajya Sabha seat each in Kerala and Uttar Pradesh will be held on August 24.

The bye-polls are being held for the Rajya Sabha seats left vacant due to the deaths of two Members of Parliament – Beni Prasad Verma from Uttar Pradesh and MP Veerendra Kumar from Kerala.

The Election Commission said that the notification for the polls will be issued on August 6. The last date for filing nomination for the elections is August 13 and the deadline for withdrawing it is August 17. Voting will take place between 9 am and 4 pm on August 24.

The Election Commission also directed the chief secretaries of the two states to assign a senior officer the responsibility of safely conducting the voting process amid the coronavirus crisis.

The voting for 24 Rajya Sabha seats across 10 states was held on June 20. Most of the elections were deferred because of the coronavirus pandemic. Elections were held for four seats each in Karnataka, Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh, three each in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, two in Jharkhand and once each in Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya and Manipur.