New Delhi, September 9: Voting for the Vice Presidential election began on Tuesday morning at Parliament House, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi casting the first vote in what is shaping up as a direct contest between the ruling NDA’s nominee, C. P. Radhakrishnan, and the joint opposition candidate, B. Sudershan Reddy, a former Supreme Court judge. The election was necessitated by the sudden resignation of Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar.
Members of both Houses of Parliament are casting their ballots through a secret vote between 10 am and 5 pm. The counting will begin at 6 pm, with results expected late in the evening. The electoral college comprises 781 members—245 from the Rajya Sabha and 536 from the Lok Sabha—after accounting for seven vacancies. With the majority mark set at 391, the NDA, with 425 MPs, enjoys a clear numerical advantage over the opposition’s 324.
Union ministers Rajnath Singh, Arjun Ram Meghwal, and Kiren Rijiju were among the early voters, along with Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairperson Harivansh, BJP MP Kangana Ranaut, and SP leader Ram Gopal Yadav.
Three regional parties—the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) in Odisha, the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) in Punjab, and the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) in Telangana—have opted to abstain from voting, positioning themselves outside both camps. The BRS leadership has linked its abstention to the agrarian crisis and farmers’ distress, while the BJD and SAD have chosen not to align with either bloc.
With its parliamentary strength, the BJP-led NDA is widely expected to secure the post for Radhakrishnan, who, if elected, will succeed Dhankhar as Vice President and take over as the ex-officio Chairperson of the Rajya Sabha.
