Presidential election 2017: The polling for country’s most important person, the President, started on Monday morning at Parliament in New Delhi. The voting is being done by the elected representatives of the Parliament and various state assemblies to pick the person who will be replacing Pranab Mukherjee as the next President of India. President Mukherjee’s term is expiring on July 25. It is a clear battle between National Democratic Alliance (NDA) candidate Ram Nath Kovind and United Progressive Alliance (UPA) candidate Meira Kumar. Kovind is a leader and a politician from the BJP who also served as the Governor of Bihar. On the other hand, Meira Kumar is the former Lok Sabha speaker.

With the total strength of Electoral college being 10,98,903 votes given that an MLA’s vote depends on the population of the state he or she represents, we are up for some interesting scenarios. The number of votes required to win the election is 5,49,422 and according to the figures given by Times Now, here are the possibilities that could arise:

1. The National Democratic Alliance (NDA) currently has 5,37,614 votes in its favour leaving it in need of another 12,000 votes. In case all the AIADMK MLAs and MPs vote for Ram Nath Kovind as promised, he will have 5,96,838 votes in his favour giving him an easy victory.

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2. However, what if all AIADMK MLAs and MPs vote for Kovind but one of BJP’s allies decides to vote against him. In case, Shiv Sena which has 25,893 votes decides to oppose Kovind, even then he will have 5,70,945 votes to his name.

3. This doesn’t mean that Kovind has clear road. If both Shiv Sena and AIADMK decide to vote against him, then Kovind might fall short of the halfway mark, even if he gets votes from BJD. In this case, he will have 5,48,221 votes to his name.

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4. Coming to Meira Kumar, given that UPA is in minority this time, she will require a lot of outside support. The Opposition has 4,02,230 votes in its pocket and even if AIADMK (25,893), TRS (23,200) and BJD (36,500) vote in her favour, she will fall short of the required votes with 5,21,154 votes to her name.

5. However, if Shiv Sena (25,893) and the Aam Aadmi Party (9,038) too decide to vote for Meira Kumar, then she will be the next President of India. In this case, the former Lok Sabha Speaker will end up with 5,56,085 votes to her name.