New Delhi: Vice-President Mohammad Hamid Ansari today won a second term in office equalling the record established by Dr Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan by securing 490 votes as against 238 votes of NDA candidate Jaswant Singh.
The half-way mark in the election where 736 MPs of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha cast their votes was 365, Returning Officer and Lok Sabha Secretary General T K Viswanathan said announcing the results. There were eight invalid votes.
Biju Janata Dal, Telugu Desam and Revolutionary Socialist Party of the Left Front opted to abstain from voting.
There was hardly any doubt regarding the success of Mr Ansari, a career diplomat-cum-scholar in the election for the second highest constitutional post.
The UPA had numbers on its side with all the allies including Trinamool Congress, DMK and Nationalist Congress Party supporting Mr Ansari in the polls.
The Janata Dal (United) and Shiv Sena of the NDA which had voted for the UPA candidate Pranab Mukherjee in the presidential polls this time supported NDA nominee Jaswant Singh of the BJP.
