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Pratibha Patil victory : Stage set for 2009 elections |
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B.I. Saini
As expected, UPA-Left nominee Pratibha Patil has romped home to Rashtrapati Bhavan with a victory margin of more than 300,000 votes over the NDA-supported Independent candidate Bhairon Singh Shekhawat. In a sense, the victory is historic as Pratibha Patil is the first woman and the first person from Maharashtra to be elected President of India since Independence.
Saturday’s announcement that Pratibha Patil has won came after the most bitterly fought Presidential election ever. For the first time, there were attacks on the personal integrity of a Presidential candidate, with the BJP raising a host of allegations of financial impropriety against Pratibha Patil, even alleging that she was trying to shield her kin in a murder case. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh called the BJP campaign against Pratibha Patil as “sheer mudslinging” and said that the UPA nominee’s victory by a huge margin over BJP-backed Shekhawat was a vote against divisiveness. Faced with the BJP onslaught on Pratibha Patil, the Congress did not shy away from coming out with its list of allegations against Vice President Shekhawat.
There are no signs that the war of words between the Congress and the BJP, the two main contenders for power at the national level, is going to end with Pratibha Patil’s victory. The BJP has said that though it will cooperate with the new President, it is not going to give up the demand for a thorough probe into the allegations against her and her relatives. With the BJP saying that Pratibha Patil was handpicked by Congress president Sonia Gandhi for the presidential election, the party is likely to closely track every step taken by the new Rashtrapati Bhavan occupant in pursuit of its plan to attack the Sonia Gandhi-led Congress and United Progressive Alliance (UPA).
That bitterness generated in the Presidential election is not going to end, is also evident from the move by the NDA and the Third Front or United National Progressive Alliance (UNPA) to put up their candidates for the Vice Presidential election, even though there is no chance of their candidates winning, given the arithmetic in Parliament. The UPA and the Left combined have a clear majority in both Houses of Parliament - the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha - whose members constitute the Electoral College for the Vice Presidential election. The Left, which played the key role in the selection of the UPA-Left nominee for the Vice President’s post, had indicated that it was prepared to work for the widest possible backing for the person to be elected Vice President. But even while it was talking of having discussions with the Third Front on the Vice Presidential election, the UNPA came out with the name of its candidate, effectively scuttling the Left move for a consensus candidate. The NDA has been saying that it will also be fielding its candidate in the Vice Presidential election, but has not come out with the name of its nominee so far. Veteran BJP leader and former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee has been authorised by the NDA to select its candidate for the post of Vice President. He may come out with the name any time now even though it is clear that the NDA nominee and UNPA nominee have no chance of winning.
In the Presidential election, the BJP had talked of a “conscience” vote by the electors on the ground that they should look at controversies surrounding Pratibha Patil and the “clean image” of Bhairon Singh Shekhawat while casting their votes. But if the BJP thought that the “conscience” vote move would benefit Shekhawat, it was sadly mistaken. As the voting figures from various states in the Presidential election show, there was more cross-voting from NDA’s ranks in favour of Pratibha Patil than from UPA’s ranks in favour of Shekhawat. BJP’s oldest ally in the NDA, the Shiv Sena had made clear when the UPA put up Pratibha Patil as its candidate that it was going to support her candidature because she was from Maharashtra. Obviously, provincialism counted for more than Hindutva ideology. The Trinamul Congress, a constituent of the NDA, kept away from the voting, indicating that it may not necessarily align with the BJP during the Lok Sabha elections in 2009.
The Presidential election has brought to light the differences in the Third Front, formed just about a month back. Though the UNPA had decided to abstain in the Presidential election, several MPs and MLAs belonging to the All India Anna DMK exercised their vote in Shekhawat’s favour. But another UNPA constituent, the National Conference, which had joined the Front just before the Presidential election, voted in favour of Pratibha Patil.
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