India on Thursday will know who will succeed incumbent Ram Nath Kovind to become the country’s 15th President, as counting of votes for the presidential election begins at 11 am at the Parliament House here.Ruling NDA’s Droupadi Murmu and Opposition’s Yashwant Sinha are pitted against each other in the contest, with votes clearly stacked in favour of Murmu, who, if elected, will be the first tribal woman to occupy the top constitutional post in the country.
Kovind’s tenure is ending on July 24 and the new president will take oath on July 25.With ballot boxes from all states having reached the Parliament House, poll officials are ready for the counting in room number 63, the strongroom of Parliament where the boxes are guarded behind a round the clock security.Rajya Sabha Secretary General P C Mody, who is the Chief Returning Officer for the poll, will oversee the counting Thursday, the result of which is likely to be declared by the evening.Mody will first brief on the poll trends after all votes of MPs have been counted, and then again after votes of 10 states in alphabetical order have been counted.Sources said he will brief once more on the poll trends after votes of 20 states have been counted, and then finally declare the result after the total counting.All ballot boxes from state assemblies had reached the Parliament’s strongroom on Tuesday evening and have been locked there since. The ballot boxes had been flown into the national capital as ‘Mr Ballot Box’ from across the states.’Mr Ballot Box’ came seated in the front row of aircraft under the watchful gaze of the Assistant Returning Officers (AROs) of their respective states.
