The Hindu : Resounding win for Shekhawat

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Aug 13, 2002

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Resounding win for Shekhawat

By K.V. Prasad

NEW DELHI AUG. 12. The National Democratic Alliance candidate, Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, was today elected the country's 12th Vice-President with a resounding margin. He defeated the joint Opposition candidate, Sushil Kumar Shinde, by 149 votes.

Mr. Shekhawat, senior BJP leader and former Rajasthan Chief Minister, polled 454 of the 766 votes cast by the Members of Parliament earlier in the day. Mr. Shinde got 305 votes, which apparently fell short of the expectation of the Opposition campaign managers.

The Lok Sabha general-secretary, G.C. Malhotra, who was the returning officer for the election, announced the result here this evening. He said that of the 788 — electoral college consisting of MPs of both the Rajya Sabha (245) and Lok Sabha (543), 766 cast their votes, and of these 7 were declared invalid.

Mr. Malhotra said that as per the requirement he would send a copy of the result to the Election Commission and the Law Ministry.

Mr. Shekhawat's victory surpassed earlier calculations of NDA poll managers. It appears that Mr. Shekhawat's campaign to woo the `Thakur' members has had its impact although it could not be ascertained immediately which section among the Opposition had broken ranks in this whipless election. The senior Congress leader, Suresh Pachauri, maintained that his party votes went according to script.

Of the 22 MPs who did not vote, 9 belonged to the Trinamool Congress who decided to stay away in protest against the Eastern Railway bifurcation issue. However, the Trinamool MP, Ajit Kumar Panja, had exercised his franchise.

The arrival of the jailed MDMK leader, Vaiko, created considerable movement inside the Parliament House complex. Mr. Vaiko came to Parliament House in the afternoon with the Parliamentary Affairs Minister, Pramod Mahajan. He left the complex immediately after casting the vote amid tight security.

Even though correspondents made efforts to engage him in a conversation, Mr. Mahajan reminded them that the High Court had asked Mr. Vaiko not to address the press while he was allowed to take part in the Vice-Presidential election.

The victory of Mr. Shekhawat was a foregone conclusion given the NDA arithmetic in Parliament with more support coming from the AIADMK, the Telugu Desam Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party.

Unlike the Presidential poll, where the NDA preferred the consensus route, in the case of the Vice-President, the BJP had from the beginning insisted that it would have `its own man' for the post — which it did.

He is expected to take the oath of office on August 19.

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