Tuesday, 19 July 2022 | PNS | Dehradun
Sixty seven MLAs of the 70 member Uttarakhand Assembly took part in the voting for electing the new President of India on Monday. Cabinet Minister Chandan Ram Das from the BJP and Congress leaders Tilak Raj Behed and Rajendra Bhandari remained absent from the voting owing to poor health.
The voting for the election of President of India started at 10 AM in room number 321 located on the second floor of the state assembly on Monday.
Cabinet Minister Ganesh Joshi was first to cast his vote. The chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami arrived in Vidhan Sabha to take part in voting at 10:30 AM on the day. The Vidhan Sabha secretary Mukesh Singhal was the returning officer of the election in Uttarakhand. The election commission had appointed L S Changsang as the observer for the election of President in Uttarakhand. He inspected the arrangements before the start of the voting. The speaker of Uttarakhand Assembly Ritu Khanduri, cabinet ministers Satpal Maharaj, Dhan Singh Rawat, Subodh Uniyal, Rekha Arya and Saurabh Bahuguna, leader of opposition in state assembly Yashpal Arya, senior Congress leader Pritam Singh, state president of BJP Madan Kaushik, BSP leader Sarvat Karim Ansari and others took part in the voting. The voting ended at 5 PM after which the ballot box was sealed in the presence of the observer and was dispatched to Delhi.
Exuding confidence in the victory of Droupadi Murmu, the CM Dhami said that her election is a mere formality. He said that Murmu got the votes of all BJP and BSP members in Uttarakhand. The members were debarred from carrying mobile phones, wireless sets and cameras to the polling centre in the polling centre.
In the election of President of India, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) has fielded Droupadi Murmu, who is a native of tribal dominated Mayurbhanj district of Odisha while former cabinet minister Yashwant Sinha is the candidate of the opposition parties.
