Prez Polling begins in strict vigil

July 19: The exercise of president election begins today at 10 am in the room no 62 of the parliamentary house along with 30 capitals of states and Union Territories across the country, which will decide the fate of the first citizen of India. Quick voting was reported across the country as many MPs and MLA’s have reached well before the time for casting their votes. The election commission has imposed the tight vigil around the parliament house for impartial polling as this election has been proved as one of the most bitterly contested presidential elections. The election is going on manually not mechanically.

There is straight contestant between UPA-Left candidate and Present Rajasthan Governor Pratibha Patil and Independent but NDA-backed candidate Bhairon Singh Shekhawat who is the present Vice president of India. It is assumed that Partibha Patil may be the next President on the basis of number of supporters if there is no cross-voting. If Pratibha wins, she will be the first lady president of India.

According to the reports, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi were among the first to cast their votes while Giridhari Lal Bhargav, the BJP MP from Jaipur claimed to be the first to cast his vote. Besides these Lalu Prasad Yadav, P Chidambaram, Pranab Mukherjee, Kapil Sibal, Shivraj Patil, Abhishek Manu Singhvi, Praful Patel and NCP chief Sharad Pawar along with her daughter Supriya Sule are the first to vote in initial hours.

In the series of president election controversy, the newly organised United National Progressive Alliance or Third Front announced to not to attend the polling, while AIADMK and MDMK have broken the treaty of the third front. Though it is not confirmed yet the members of AIADMK and MDMK has been voted or not, them were seen on the spot but they claimed to go there for the parliamentary work. On the other hand, the other constituents of the UNPA like Samajwadi Party, TDP, AGP and INLD have decided to abstain from the election.

There are a total number of 4,896 strong electoral college in which 776 are Members of Parliament, MPs and rest 4,120 are members of Legislative Assembly, MLAs across the country. The total value of the vote is worth 10.98 lakhs in which each MP’s vote value is 708 and the total value of their votes is 5,49,408 whereas the total value of MLAs is 5,49,474 of 4,120 MLAs that varies according to states. UP MLAs are among the top with having value of each vote is 208 follows by Jharkhand where the value of the vote of each MLA is 176. Maharashtra is on the third position with value of 175 and Bihar on the fifth with having value of 173 for each vote. Sikkim is on the lowest weightage of MLAs where the value of each vote is seven only.

Besides MPs, five MLAs include one from Bihar and four from North East will cast their vote in the Parliament House. Election Commission has also permitted the 51MPs includes Sahabuddin, the MP of Siwan Lok Sabha constituencies to cast their ballot in their own state's assemblies or some other place. Overseas Affairs Minister Vayalar Ravi, who is an MP from Kerala, will cast his vote in Chennai.

The Election Commission has decided to carry on the voting process manually; there are green ballets for MPs while MLAs will cast their votes on pink ballet papers. The ballot paper has two column printed with the name of both the contestants. In the process of tight vigilance, Election Commission has issued orders to check the proper identification of voters for the first time. In the vigilance process videography of all the six polling booths has been carrying on strictly and no mobile phones are allowed near the booths. Six polling booths have been set up for smooth voting.