New Delhi, September 10: – Three regional parties — the Biju Janata Dal (BJD), the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) and the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) — said on Monday they will abstain from voting in Tuesday’s vice-presidential election, a move unlikely to affect the prospects of ruling alliance candidate C.P. Radhakrishnan.
The three parties, which together account for 12 seats in both houses of parliament, stressed they were not aligned with either Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s National Democratic Alliance (NDA) or the opposition INDIA bloc. The SAD, however, framed its boycott as a protest, accusing both the BJP-led Centre and opposition parties of ignoring Punjab’s flood crisis.
If all members cast their votes, the NDA holds the support of about 432 lawmakers compared with the opposition bloc’s 324 — a margin of roughly 115 votes. That would mark the narrowest gap in a vice-presidential contest since 2014, though still enough to ensure a comfortable win for the government’s nominee.
The opposition, led by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and senior leaders including Sonia Gandhi, Sharad Pawar and T.R. Baalu, held a strategy meeting in the old parliament building to press for unity and brief MPs on voting procedures. In the 2022 election, 15 ballots were invalidated for being incorrectly marked.
“The vice-presidential poll is an ideological battle,” Samajwadi Party leader Ram Gopal Yadav said, while acknowledging the opposition lacks the numbers to prevail.
The NDA, meanwhile, gathered its MPs for a meeting chaired by Modi, who urged members to ensure full attendance and lauded parliament for recent legislative achievements. Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju said the alliance conducted a mock poll to avoid procedural errors.
The voting process requires MPs to mark the number “1” in the order-of-preference column beside their chosen candidate. Any tick marks, crosses or writing on the ballot would invalidate the vote, according to guidelines posted by the Rajya Sabha secretariat.
Attention is focused on the Shiv Sena (UBT), which holds nine Lok Sabha seats, amid speculation that some of its lawmakers may cross-vote. As voting takes place through a secret ballot, MPs are not bound by their party whip, adding a measure of uncertainty.
In 2022, NDA nominee Jagdeep Dhankhar defeated opposition candidate Margaret Alva by 346 votes. Five years earlier, Venkaiah Naidu won the vice-presidency with a margin of 272.
