Prez Polls 2022: Droupadi Murmu, Yashwant Sinha to set for face off today
18 July, 2022 | Riya Girdhar
According to the Election Commission's schedule, the votes will be counted on July 21 and the new President will take the oath of office on July 25.
Today’s elections will choose India’s 15th president; Droupadi Murmu, a candidate for the NDA, is running against Yashwant Sinha, a candidate for the opposition. However, considering the parties that expressed support for Murmu, the election is thought to be all but finished.
The main updates on this story are as follows:
On the first day of the Monsoon session of Parliament, the election will take place. Before the 2017 presidential elections, Droupadi Murmu, 64, was a serious contender for the position; nonetheless, the government ultimately chose Bihar Governor and Dalit Ram Nath Kovind.
The NDA’s selection of Murmu, a tribal woman from Odisha and a former governor of Jharkhand, is considered as a planned decision that won over both Naveen Patnaik of Odisha and the ruling Jharkhand Mukti Morcha.
Nitish Kumar, the chief minister of Bihar, has also pledged his support for Murmu despite his recent tendency to diverge from his ally BJP.
Murmu is also anticipated to receive support from both Shiv Sena groups, whose schism and the subsequent fall of the Maharashtra cabinet dominated headlines for weeks.
The NDA candidate is supported by both the Uddhav Thackeray-led group and the Eknath Shinde faction, which is linked with the BJP.
The Thackeray camp, which had been backing Yashwant Sinha of the opposition, decided to change its support for the tribal woman Murmu when 16 MPs met with Uddhav Thackeray and made the suggestion. Thackeray, according to Sinha, was coerced into endorsing Murmu.
After three suggested candidates declined, the opposition finally chose Sinha, a former Union Minister in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee administration who afterwards joined Trinamool Congress.
Sharad Pawar, the leader of the National Congress, Gopal Krishna Gandhi, the former governor, and Farooq Abdullah, the former chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir, all declined, claiming various justifications.
The Electoral College, which consists of elected representatives from all states, the National Capital Territory of Delhi, and the Union Territory of Puducherry, elects the President on behalf of the nation.
The MPs and MLAs are free to cast their votes however they wish without being subject to a party whip. According to the Election Commission’s schedule, the votes will be counted on July 21 and the new President will take the oath of office on July 25.