Counting for Presidential poll begins

New Delhi, July 21: Counting of votes cast in the 13th Presidential election began at the Parliament House amid tight security at 1100 hrs today.

Polling was held on July 19, with UPA-Left candidate Pratibha Patil pitted against Vice President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, who contested as an Independent candidate, backed by the NDA. Patil is all set to win by over 2.5 lakh votes.

The counting is being held in Room No 63, where the boxes had been kept.

The counting of the votes cast at the Parliament House was taken up first, with the process initiated by breaking open the seal of the ballot boxes in presence of the authorised election agents of both candidates Parliamentary Affairs Minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi for Mrs Patil and Satyapal Jain for Mr Shekhawat.

As the ballot boxes were opened, the ''pink'' coloured ballot papers of the MLAs, who voted here, were first taken out and kept separately, for inclusion in the tray of the respective state as and when that state's boxes would be opened.

The ballots would be packed in a bunches of 25 each. There will be three different trays one each for the UPA candidate, the Independent candidate and one for the disputed ones. The disputed ones will be placed before the Returning Officer (RO) for the final judgement and accordingly, placed in the appropriate tray or rejected.

In the case of States, the counting will be taken up in the alphabetic order.

The entire process is expected to be completed by 1400 hrs, Lok Sabha Secretary General P D T Achary, who was the Returning Officer for the election, told sources yesterday.

As many 88.5 per cent of MPs and 91 per cent of MLAs belonging to the electoral college exercised their franchise.

Though the total strength of MPs is 776, the effective strength was 770. As many as 636 cast votes in Parliament House polling centres while 46 cast vote in states, taking the total figure to 682 MPs or 88.5 per cent.

Of the total 4,120 MLAs, 3,755 MLAs voted making the figure 91 per cent. Eight states Chhatisgarh, Gujarat, Goa, Manipur, Rajasthan, Sikkim, Himachal Pradesh and Puducherry had reported 100 per cent polling.

UNI