The National Democratic Alliance candidate Jagdeep Dhankhar won the vice presidential election by comfortably beating the opposition’s Margaret Alva.
Dhankhar, former West Bengal governor, bagged 528 of the total 725 votes, ANI reported citing Lok Sabha General Secretary Utpal Singh. Margaret Alva received 182 votes, while 15 were termed invalid.
Numbers were stacked in favour of Dhankhar because of cracks in the opposition. PTI earlier reported that as many as 55 MPs did not vote in the vice presidential election held from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday.
The Trinamool Congress, with 36 MPs, including 23 in Lok Sabha, had abstained from the election. However, two of its MPs had cast their ballots.
The electoral college in the vice presidential election comprises a total of 788 members of both Houses of Parliament. Since all the electors are members of parliament, the value of vote of each MP is one.
Dhankhar has been in the limelight since becoming the governor of West Bengal in July 2019 over frequent run-ins with the Mamata Banerjee government.
A lawyer by profession, Dhankhar forayed into politics in 1989 and was elected to the Lok Sabha from Jhunjhunu in Rajasthan that same year and became a union minister in 1990.
Dhankhar, who practised in the Rajasthan High Court and the Supreme Court, was designated a senior advocate in 1990, the same year he became a union minister.
He was also a member of the Rajasthan Vidhan Sabha from 1993 to 1998 representing Kishangarh constituency.