New Delhi, September 9: The National Democratic Alliance (NDA) candidate and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader CP Radhakrishnan has won the Vice President election. He will be the 15th Vice President of India.
He got 452 votes in the Vice President election on Tuesday while his rival Indi Alliance candidate B Sudarshan Reddy got 300 votes. CP Radhakrishnan, apart from his duties as Governor of Telangana and Lieutenant Governor of Puducherry, is also currently the Governor of Maharashtra.
Voting and subsequent counting took place in the Parliament House complex from 10 am to 5 pm on Tuesday.
Announcing the result, Rajya Sabha Secretary General PC Modi said that counting of votes for the Vice President election started at 6 pm. There were a total of 781 votes in this election. Today 98.2 percent voting took place. He said that NDA candidate CP Radhakrishnan got 452 first preference votes. He has been elected as the Vice President of India. Justice B. Sudarshan Reddy, the opposition’s candidate for the post of Vice President, got 300 first preference votes.
He told that a total of 767 MPs cast their votes in this election, out of which 15 were found invalid, while one MP used his postal ballot. There is a festive atmosphere at the house of MP Prahlad Joshi on the victory of CP Radhakrishnan for the post of Vice President. CP Radhakrishnan has reached Prahlad Joshi’s house. South Indian artists are present there with their musical instruments.
According to sources, many MPs and leaders of the alliance including the Prime Minister will reach his house to congratulate CP Radhakrishnan.
It is noteworthy that after the sudden resignation of Jagdeep Dhankhar due to health reasons, Vice Presidential elections were held in the country.
A look at the political journey of CP Radhakrishnan
Chandrapuram Ponnusamy (CP) Radhakrishnan was born in the Kongu Vellalar Gounder community in Tirupur, Tamil Nadu. He received his Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) from VO Chidambaram College in Thoothukudi, Tamil Nadu. Apart from his academic achievements, he demonstrated his diverse interests at an early age by winning the college-level table tennis championship.
Radhakrishnan started actively participating in the Bharatiya Jana Sangh and RSS at the age of 17. His long political career began in 1974 when he was elected to the State Executive Committee of the Jana Sangh, which was his official debut in politics. CP Radhakrishnan won the Coimbatore Lok Sabha seat in 1998 and 1999. His victory in 1998 was notable as he was one of the three BJP candidates in Tamil Nadu when the party formed an alliance with the AIADMK, which was an important political milestone in the state. In 2004, he was also a member of the Indian legislative delegation to the United Nations General Assembly, where he spoke on disaster relief and humanitarian coordination.
He furthered his political career in Tamil Nadu as the BJP state president from 2004 to 2007. During this time, he undertook a 93-day “Rath Yatra” covering 19,000 kilometres to publicise social and environmental problems across the state.
In February 2023, Prime Minister Narendra Modi appointed Radhakrishnan as the Governor of Jharkhand. In July 2024, he became the Governor of Maharashtra. Around the same time, he was also appointed Governor of Telangana and Lieutenant Governor of Puducherry.