Who is Yashwant Sinha? All about the Opposition's face for the Presidential elections 2022

As the date of filing nominations for the Presidential Elections 2022 inches closer, the Opposition parties have settled on Yashwant Sinha as their joint candidate. After the first three proposed candidate refused, Sinha's name was unanimously decided by the political parties, including the Congress and Trinamool Congress, after their high-level meeting concluded in Delhi earlier today. The date for filing the nominations is June 29 for the Presidential polls that will be conducted on July 18 followed by the counting of votes on July 21. The winner of the elections will succeed current President Ram Nath Kovind whose term ends on July 24.

Who is Yashwant Sinha?

Yashwant Sinha is a former Union Minister who recently exited the West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee-led TMC. Before being a TMC member, Sinha represented the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for the most part of his political career and was considered a veteran leader of the saffron party. The 84-year-old is a former Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer, who began his services in 1960 and resigned in 1984 to kickstart his political career.

In the same year, he joined the Janata Party and later became a member of the BJP starting in 1992. During his association with BJP, Sinha served as the Minister of Finance and Foreign Minister under the leadership of then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. However, his relations with the BJP turned sour and he split from the saffron party in April 2018. Ever since the beginning, he has been a staunch critic of the Narendra Modi government, which was a major factor in his exit from the party.

Three years later, in March 2021, Sinha became a member of TMC and was soon appointed as the party's national Vice President. Notably, the former Indian Administrator's politician son, Jayant Sinha is a member of Lok Sabha for the BJP and has served as a Union Minister under the Modi government's first term. Yashwant Sinha was selected as the fourth option for the Presidential candidate after Jammu & Kashmir National Conference chief Farooq Abdullah, Nationalist Congress Party's Sharad Pawar and former West Bengal governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi opted out of the Presidential race. While Sinha has been fielded as the candidate against BJP, the ruling party is yet to announce its candidate.