ELECTION OF THE PRESIDENT OF INDIA

Article 52 states that there shall be a President of India. The executive powers of the Union shall be vested in the President. The US Presidency represents this form. In Britain, the monarch is the symbolic head, representing the British nation. The powers of the Government are vested in the political office of the Prime Minister. The President of India is the first citizen and represents the Indian nation and does not, therefore, belong to any particular Political Party. The President of India is elected according to secret ballot by the system of proportional representation through single transferable vote. The process of election of the President of India is original and no other Constitution contains a similar procedure. The President shall be elected by the members of an electoral college consisting of - The elected members of both Houses of Parliament and the elected members of the Legislative Assemblies of the States (including National Capital Territory of Delhi and the Union Territory of Pondicherry vide the Constitution 70th amendment Act, 1992). An attempt has been made to secure the uniformity of representation of the different states, according to population and the total number of elected members of legislative Assembly of each state so that parity may be maintained between the state as a whole and the union. This has been done to ensure that the votes of the states shall be equal to that of population of the country. In the election of the President the weightage system is used to bring about parity between the votes of the Members of Parliament and the Members of the Assemblies. Since the strength of legislative assemblies differ owing to differences in population the exact weight of votes of the members of the Assemblies are determined by a definite formula by dividing the population of the concerned state by the total number of elected members of the Assembly which is further divided by one thousand. If the remainder is less than to 500 is should not be taken into account. If it is more than 500 the member should be increased by one. To put it in simpler words, each member of the electoral college who is a member of a State Legislative Assembly will have a number of votes calculated as follows: Value of Vote of an MLA = State Population / (1000' Total no. of elected MLA's). Fractions exceeding one half is being counted as one. The following illustrations explain the method of calculation: Let the population of Andhra Pradesh is 43,502,708. Let us take the total number of elected members in the Legislative Assembly of Andhra Pradesh to be 294. To obtain the number of votes which each such elected member will be entitled to cast at the election of the President we have first to divide 43,502,708 (which is the population) by 294 (which is the total number of elected members), and then to divide the quotient by 1,000. In this case the quotient is 147,968.3945. The number of votes which each such member will be entitled to cast would be 147,968.3945/1000 i.e. 148. On the basis of the above formula, the value of the vote of an MLA from UP has the highest value and that from Sikkim the lowest. The formula adopted to secure uniformity between all the States on one hand and the Parliament on the other is as follows: Value of Vote of an MP = Total value of votes of MLA's of all States / Total no. of elected MP's (LS + RS). Fractions exceeding one-half is being counted as one. Further the Article 55(3) of Indian Constitution requires that the President should be elected in accordance with the system of proportional representation by means of the single transferable vote. The underlying principle of proportional representation is to prevent the exclusion of minorities from the benefits of the State, and to give each minority group an effective share in the political life. The aim of proportional representation is to give every division of opinion among electors corresponding representation in national or local assemblies. In the ordinary mode of election known as "straight voting system", a candidate getting the support of the numerically largest group is elected, although the combined strength of all other candidates representing different other parties may far out-number his supporters. The result is that the elected candidate cannot be said to represent the opinion of the majority of the electorate as a whole. In the case of the election of the President the method is as follows: Let the total number of valid votes is 15,000 and there are four candidates, A,B,C,D. Suppose, they have polled votes as follows: A.................. 5,250 B..... ..... ..... ..... 4,800 C..... ..... ..... ..... 2,700 D..... ..... ..... ..... 2,250 In the ordinary system of election by simple majority vote, A would be elected forthwith since a voter in this system marks only one preference and as such no question of counting any further preferences, say the second or the third, arises. In the case of the "alternative vote system" it is, however, not so, as it may be that the second best candidate may be declared elected, as against the candidate who might have secured the majority of first preference votes. Total number of valid votes cast Quota = ----------------------------------------------------------- +1 Total number of seats to be filled +1 In the illustration mentioned above the quota will be - (15,000 / 1+1) +1 = 7501 No candidate who secures less than 7,501 votes can, in this case of election through the system of proportional representation, be elected. It thus follows that if a candidate is able to secure 7,501 or more first preference votes in his favour, he is immediately declared elected and there does not remain any need to take a second or subsequent count. But if at the end of any count, no candidate can be declared elected - (a) Exclude the candidate who upto that stage has been credited with the lowest number of votes; (b) Examine all the ballot papers in his parcel and sub-parcels, arrange the unexhausted papers in sub-parcels according to the next available preferences recorded thereon for the continuing candidates; (c) See whether any of the continuing candidates has, after such transfer and credit, secured the quota. This process continues until a candidate with the requisite quota emerges. It would, therefore, be seen that in case where no member has obtained the quota votes fixed for election, the prescribed method of transfer of votes follows a process of elimination of the candidate who is at the lowest rung in the order of polling according to the first preference and so on, till at last such a candidate is found who has obtained the quota of votes or if there is no such candidate, all candidates except one are, one after the other, eliminated from the field. The candidate who survives the process of elimination is in such a case returned as the President. The present system of election for the President has been adopted under the Constitution of India, in order to maintain the neutrality of the head of State, which both the ceremonial functions in any federation and the specific powers under a parliamentary system demand and also to render it acceptable to as wide a body of opinion as possible. Whenever the presidential office falls vacant on account of his death, resignation or impeachment the Vice-President succeeds him for a period of six months. The election of the President must be conducted within six months from the date of vacancy. In case of resignation, the President hands over the letter to the Vice-President of India.