Ansari to file nomination papers today, Pawar to attend
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and leaders of various constituents of the ruling alliance will be present on the occasion.
Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pawan Kumar Bansal said that NCP leader and Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar, who had skipped the UPA meeting where Ansari’s candidature was announced, will also join them. “We are hopeful of crossing the 500-mark (of the total 790 votes),” Bansal said, while maintaining that the UPA had an assured support of at least 470 MPs.
NDA candidate Jaswant Singh is likely to file his nomination papers on July 20.
A total of 22 people have so far jumped into the fray, but none of them has been able to mobilise the mandatory 20 proposers, drawn from among the MPs, to meet the basic requirement, in the absence of which their nomination papers will be rejected during scrutiny.
The NDA is hopeful of getting the support of AIADMK and BJD for Jaswant Singh in the backdrop of the support extended by the Opposition to its nominee P A Sangma in the Presidential election. Both parties have not taken any decision on the issue yet. The BJP is also trying to rope in regional outfits like the YSR Congress, TDP, AGP, INLD. YSR Congress chief Jagan Mohan Reddy’s mother Y S Vijayamma had met NDA convener
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