The BJP-led NDA’s presidential candidate Droupadi Murmu was on Thursday elected as the 15th president of India. She defeated Opposition nominee Yashwant Sinha.
With this, Murmu becomes the first tribal president and the second female president of India after Pratibha Patil.
Here’s all you need to know about Droupadi Murmu:
- Droupadi Murmu was born on 20 June 1958 in Baidaposi village of Mayurbhanj district in Odisha.
- in her political career, during the Bharatiya Janata Party and Biju Janata Dal coalition government in Odisha, Murmu was the Minister of State with independent charge for Commerce and Transport from March 6, 2000 to August 6, 2002 and Fisheries and Animal Resources Development from August 6, 2002 to May 16, 2004. She was former Odisha Minister and an MLA from Rairangpur assembly constituency in the years 2000 and 2004.
- Murmu is the first woman Governor of Jharkhand. She is the first woman and tribal leader from Odisha to be appointed a governor in an Indian state.
How was the President of India chosen?
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party had projected Murmu as a leader representing poor tribal communities.
The president in India is chosen by an electoral college that consists of elected lawmakers in both houses of Parliament (Rajya Sabha & Lok Sabha) and elected members of the legislative assemblies of all states.
The role of the President in India
The president’s position can be important during times of political uncertainty such as a hung Parliament, when the office assumes greater power.
Oppn’s Yashwant Sinha who lost the Presidential race against Murmu
Murmu’s main opponent was a former Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) rebel. Yashwant Sinha served as the finance minister in the government of former PM Chandrashekhar from 1990 to 1991 and again in the government of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee from 1998 to 2002.
Before leaving the party in 2018, he was a senior leader of the BJP. After this, he joined the All India Trinamool Congress. However, he left TMC and later was chosen as the presidential candidate.