Electoral math: Here is why BJP’s Kovind will easily be the 14th President of India
- BJP’s choice for Presidential Candidate, Ram Nath Kovind has the magical numbers
- Congress candidate Meira Kumar, a Dalit candidate, is likely to suffer setback
- NDA has 48 per cent votes, but with the support of other parties it has garnered more than 60 percent votes
FollowThe BJP recently surprised everyone by announcing Ram Nath Kovind as its Presidential candidate. Stating that Kovind is a Dalit, BJP is trying to garner votes from its allies. However, the Congress too announced Meira Kumar, a Dalit candidate and former Speaker as its Presidential candidate.
BJP already has about 48% of the required votes through the NDA, with the support of both factions of the AIADMK, the YSR Congress and a host of other smaller parties. Currently, regional parties including YSR Congress have come forward to support the BJP candidate. Here is the process how the President of India is elected:
Election process
The President of India is elected by an electoral college, consisting of the elected members of both houses of Parliament, the elected members of the Legislative Assemblies of the 29 states and the elected members of the legislative assemblies of the Union Territories of Delhi and Puducherry.
Currently, the electoral college has 776 MPs and 4120 MLAs. The total strength of the Electoral College is 10,98,882 votes. The halfway mark is 5,49,442 votes. After the latest state assembly elections and by-polls of 2017, NDA is short of some 20,000 votes.
Value of a vote
However, every vote has a different value. As per the calculation, the value of the vote of one MLA depends on the state’s population divided by one thousand times the number of seats in that particular state’s legislative assembly.
For example: If a Sikkim MLAs value is 7, Uttar Pradesh MLA’s value is 208.
MPs vote is equal to the total value of all MLA votes divided by the total number of MPs. In the coming elections, one MP is valued at 708 votes.
Magic number
BJP needs at least one vote in addition to the 50 percent votes to make its candidate the President of India. Already the NDA (with allies) it has 48.93 percent votes with an electoral college strength of 5,37,683 and is short of just 20,000 votes, according to the Times of India report.
NDA is also supported by TRS with 2 percent votes; AIADMK with 5.39 percent, BJD with 2.99 per cent and YSR Congress with 1.53 percent has garnered 60.84 percent votes, stated Huffington Post.
Thus the numbers indicate that NDA has necessary numbers to make Ram Nath Kovind the President.
This statistics also show that the path to electing its candidate for the post is most likely an impossible one for the Congress because it has less than 40 percent votes on its side.
Moreover, it is also reported that JD(U) with 1.91 percent vote share, SP with 2.37 percent votes and BSP with 0.86 percent votes are likely to support BJP candidate Ram Nath Kovind. If this happens, Kovind will muster around 65.98 per cent votes against Congress candidate Meira Kumar.
