Droupadi Murmu is BJP-led NDA candidate for Presidential polls

Bharatiya Janata Party president J P Nadda on Tuesday announced former Jharkhand governor Droupadi Murmu as the National Democratic Alliance’s presidential nominee. Nadda said that there were deliberations on as many as 20 names.

“She had started work as a teacher, and has spent years in the field of education,” Nadda said while introducing Murmu during a press conference at the party’s headquarters. Nadda said that eventually a consensus was reached on picking a face from east India, a tribal and a woman.

If elected, Murmu will be the first tribal and second woman President. Her elevation will be part of the BJP’s tribal outreach in election going states like Gujarat, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, and Madhya Pradesh. In Gujarat, where the tribal population is significant, the Bharatiya Tribal Party has this year announced an alliance with the Aam Aadmi Party.

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In Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh as well as Chhattisgarh, where elections are scheduled to be held next year, the population of tribals is significant. Additionally, the BJP perceives women as a caste-neutral constituency.

Murmu’s name emerged after senior leaders of the party’s Parliamentary Board, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and Cabinet ministers Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh and Nitin Gadkari, as well as Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and National General Secretary (Organisation) B L Santhosh, besides Nadda, met late Tuesday evening to finalise the name of the party’s Presidential candidate.

The meeting, held at the party’s headquarters, went on for more than two hours. Vice-president Venkaiah Naidu and Kerala governor Arif Mohammed Khan were the other frontrunners for the post. Speculations on Naidu’s name rose after Nadda and Shah were seen meeting Naidu at his residence to hold talks over the matter. Prior to the meeting at Naidu’s house, Nadda and Shah were seen meeting at Shah’s house briefly.

The NDA is well-poised to win the elections, with BJP holding 49 per cent of the votes in the electoral college. The party had entrusted Nadda and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh to hold talks with other parties, including with the Opposition as well as non-NDA and non-UPA parties, to build a consensus.

Singh had earlier reached out to Opposition leaders including Congress’s Mallikarjun Kharge, West Bengal CM and Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee, Samajwadi Party chief Akhileh Yadav, and Maharashtra CM and Shiv Sena leader Uddhav Thackeray.

To cobble up the numbers, Singh had also reached out to NDA allies Biju Janata Dal, Janata Dal (United) and YSR Congress. Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik, Bihar CM Nitish Kumar and Andhra CM Y S Jagan Reddy are those that Singh reached out to for a consensus.

On Monday, BJP president Nadda also held meetings with the party’s 14-member management team to flesh out the party’s strategy for the presidential polls, which will be held on July 18.