As the election to choose India’s 15th President began on Monday at Tilak Bhawan of Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly at 10 am, with BJP’s candidate Draupadi Murmu having support of most of the Opposition, it seems some political parties fear cross-voting by their MLAs.
BJP’s Draupadi Murmu, who is being pitted against Opposition candidate Yashwant Sinha, is predicted to secure more than 78% votes.
Though Suheldev Bhartiya Samaj Party (SBSP) has announced its support to Murmu but it is expected that three out of six party MLAs may not vote for her. The Samajwadi Party, which supports opposition candidate Yashwant Sinha, has claimed three MLAs of Omprakash Rajbhar-led SBSP will support Sinha.
It is being speculated that SBSP MLA Dudhram from Mahadeva of Basti, Jagdish Narayan SBSP MLA from Jafrabad seat of Jaunpur and Mau Sadar MLA Abbas Ansari can do cross-voting as they originally belonged to the SP but had contested the election on SBSP ticket as per the adjustment formula of the alliance between SP and SBSP. However, SBSP chief OP Rajbhar has asserted confidence that all his six MLAs will vote for Draupadi Murmu as announced by the party.
The Samajwadi Party had hosted a dinner on Sunday for its MLAs ahead of voting for the Presidential election.
Uttar Pradesh houses 80 MPs and 403 MLAs who are voting today. The value of the one vote of an MP is 700 while that of an MLA is 208. Going by these equations, the total value of the vote of the MPs of UP is 56,000 while the total value of votes of MLAs is 83,824. In this way, the total value of votes of MPs and MLAs of UP is 1,39,824.
The BJP has the support of 76 MPs, including the Bahujan Samaj Party. Nearly 10 additional MLAs from SBSP, Jansatta Dal and Samajwadi Party MLA Shivpal Yadav are also supporting BJP’s Murmu. In such a situation, it is expected that Murmu could secure more than 1.10 lakh vote value from Uttar Pradesh.
With inputs from News18
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