West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar on Saturday has been elected as the 14th Vice President of India.
Nominated by National Democratic Alliance (NDA), a coalition led by federally ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Dhankhar defeated Margaret Alva, who was nominated by the Opposition parties.
Out of a possible 788, a total of 725 parliamentarians voted in the election. Dhankhar received 528 votes, Alva got 182 votes and 15 votes were ruined.
He will be the second politician from Rajasthan to be elected as vice-president after Bhairon Singh Shekhawat.
Dhankhar’s victory was pretty much guaranteed since regional parties such as the Janata Dal (United), Yuvajana Shramika Rythu Congress Party (YSRCP), Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) and Shiv Sena announced their support for him.
Alva, for her part, was supported by the country’s main opposition party Congress, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) and Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS).
The Trinamool Congress (TMC), the second largest Opposition party after Congress in Parliament with 36 parliamentarians in both Houses, decided to abstain from voting. However, two of its parliamentarians defied the party’s stand and voted in the election.
The election for the office of vice-president was needed as Muppavarapu Venkaiah Naidu’s tenure ends on August 10.
Who is Jagdeep Dhankhar?
The 71-year-old Dhankhar comes from Rajasthan state and belongs to the Jat community. He is a well-known lawyer and has been a member of Rajasthan High Court as well as Supreme Court of India.
He was elected to represent the Rajasthan constituency of Jhunjhunu in parliament for the first time in 1989 when he won an election standing for the Janata Dal party.
He served as Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs in 1990, in the government led by then Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar.
The minority government failed in 1991 after which Dhankhar joined Congress party and was elected as a legislator from Rajasthan's Kishangarh in 1993.
Later, he joined BJP in 2003 and in 2019 was appointed as Governor of West Bengal state.