Presidential election: Shiv Sena MP avers committee constituted to find Oppn's candidate

Shiv Sena Rajya Sabha member Priyanka Chaturvedi, who recently attended the meeting of opposition parties chaired by Mamata Banerjee, announced that a coordination committee will be constituted to find a suitable candidate for the position of the President of India.

Speaking to ANI, Priyanka Chaturvedi said, "A coordination committee will be formed to find a suitable candidate for the position of President of India. The meeting was held unanimously and everyone discussed their opinions on the right candidate. We need to take a uniform decision if we want to either protect our democracy or constitution."

Notably, on June 15, seventeen Opposition parties, on the call of TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee came under the same roof to discuss the forthcoming presidential elections where a resolution was adopted to field a common candidate in the election slated for July 18.

Responsibility of Oppn to unite & protect democracy: Priyanka Chaturvedi

The Shiv Sena MP further added that the NCP supremo, Sharad Pawar does not want to be a candidate for the presidential election. Speaking about Pawar declining candidature, she said, "He does not want to be a candidate for Presidential elections as of now. All the Opposition parties will hold a meeting again and take the decision about it. All the parties who do want to fight against BJP will be included in the Opposition meeting." Adding further, she said that after 75 years of India's independence, it is the responsibility of the opposition to unite and protect the democracy as well as the constitution.

Current tally of NDA, UPA for Presidential election

After the announcement of the presidential polls, all the political parties are gearing up to tie up an alliance with each other to elect their candidate. In the current scenario, the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) has about 5.26 lakh votes in total which is roughly about 49% of the total vote. This means that NDA will require 1% more votes to get its candidate elected for the President. And to do this, the NDA just needs one of the three parties - YSRCP or BJD or AIADMK to back its candidate. It is pertinent to mention that all of these three parties had supported NDA's 2017 President candidate Ram Nath Kovind. Notably, the Jaggan Mohan Reddy's YSRCP has already been on board with NDA for the presidential elections making it easier for the NDA to secure its candidate's victory. 

Meanwhile, coming to the opposition, Congress has about 10% of the total votes and UPA including the Grand Old Party has over 25% of the votes. If we add the rest of the opposition's votes, the tally will only see an up of 10%, making the entire poll of opposition votes share to 35%.