Vice Presidential Election 2025, Radhakrishnan Vs Reddy: The contest to the Indian Vice President was becoming a high profile one with the ruling National Democratic Alliance nominating as its candidate Maharashtra Governor C. P. Radhakrishnan and the opposition INDIA coalition came forward with its candidate of former Supreme Court Judge B. Sudershan Reddy. The two leaders have differing backgrounds in terms of profession as one is a politician and the other one is a judge.
Veteran BJP leader Radhakrishnan has been associated with the organisational work of the party in the state since long. A two-term MP Coimbatore and ex-president of the Tamil Nadu BJP, he has been instrumental in keeping a clean image, as well as developing grass roots. In the last few years, he has served in the gubernatorial post; in February 2023, he was appointed to this post in the state of Jharkhand. He became the Governor of Maharashtra in July 2024 later being handed additional charge of Telangana and Puducherry.
The details of his financial situations form another dimension in his persona. In his 2019 election affidavit, he reported assets of approximately 67 crores including a movable property of about 7 crores (bank deposits, insurance, shares and jewellery) and immovable property worth 59 crores (agricultural land and residential land). His outstanding debts were at 2.37 crores. The reported figures of his wealth range around 55 crore rupees or 65 crore rupees. Interestingly, he has no car even though he is in a high office. Radhakrishnan is a native of Tiruppur, Tamil Nadu, and his nomination gives a further indication of NDA policy to spread southern representation visibly at the central level.
B. Sudershan Reddy in his turn, has spent his professional life in the legal/ judicial field. He is a retired Chief Justice of the Gauhati High Court, and later on served as a judge in the Supreme Court in 2007, from which he retired in 2011, having contributed in the delivery of six important judgments. He would serve as the first Lokayukta of Goa and this expanded his credibility on matters of judicial integrity. THE INDIA block has marketed him as a candidate who embodies the message of institutional independence, credibility in the context of the deep political polarities.
Observers reckon that the election itself will hardly be a formal exercise, it is a symbolic decision: between administrative experience in the person of Radhakrishnan v. judicial probity in the person of Reddy. As both candidates are southern Indians Tamil Nadu and Telangana respectively, the Ambedkarite Moment also has a strong regional construct.
It is part of the Election Commission in the coming weeks to announce the date of the election of the Vice-Presidents.
