Sinha files Prez poll nomination, Oppn calls it ‘battle of ideologies’
NEW DELHI: Opposition nominee and former Union minister Yashwant Sinha filed his nomination papers for the presidential election on Monday in the presence of leaders of 16 political parties even as the NDA candidate, former Jharkhand governor Droupadi Murmu, is all but certain to be elected to the highest office of the land.
While Telangana chief minister K Chandrashekar Rao announced his support to Sinha hours before his nomination, Jharkhand’s ruling party and key opposition constituent, Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM), which had earlier endorsed Sinha’s candidature, was conspicuous by its absence. JMM lawmakers might support Murmu — a member of the Santhal community, designated a Scheduled Tribe — in this election, a section of opposition leaders said, requesting anonymity. Shiv Sena leaders, too, were absent, but Opposition managers attributed it to the ongoing political turmoil in Maharashtra.
The President is elected through a process of proportional representation in which MLAS and MPS (except nominated ones) vote. With the AIADMK, BJD and YSRCP announcing their support in favour of Murmu, she now enjoys 609,587 votes of 1,086,431 votes of the electoral college. Sinha has about 392,242 votes.
The Opposition also announced an 11-member campaign committee to assist Sinha for the election scheduled to be held on July 18. Ram Gopal Yadav (Samajwadi Party), Jairam Ramesh (Congress), Tiruchi Siva (DMK), Sitaram Yechury (CPM), Praful Patel (NCP), Ranjit Reddy (TRS), Manoj Jha (RJD), D Raja (CPI) and Sukhendu Sekhar Roy (TMC) are in the panel along with Sudheendra Kulkarni, who was earlier with the BJP. “All Opposition parties are unitedly supporting Yashwant Sinha ji,” said Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who was among the leaders who accompanied Sinha. “Of course, we are supporting the individual, but the real fight is between two ideologies, one ideology of RSS, anger, hatred, and the other of compassion, of all the opposition parties, which are standing together,” Gandhi said, referring to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, ideological mentor of the BJP.