Presidential election result | Droupadi Murmu vs Yashwant Sinha—counting of votes begins at 11 am

The counting of votes to elect the country's 15th president begins at 11 am in the Parliament House on July 21 even though the outcome is a foregone conclusion with the ruling NDA’s Droupadi Murmu set to get better of Opposition candidate Yashwant Sinha.

The result is expected at around 4 pm. Rajya Sabha Secretary General PC Mody, who is the chief returning officer for the poll, will oversee the counting.

Murmu, 64, will also be the first president from a tribal community and the second woman to occupy the country's highest office.

Also read: Explained: How is the President of India elected?

The voting was held on July 18, with 4,809 lawmakers—776 members of Parliament and 4,033 elected members of legislative assemblies—eligible to vote in the election held once every five years. Over 99 percent of the electors cast their ballot, the Election Commission has said.

Victory marches, sweets

Not just the ruling coalition, even non-NDA parties such as the ruling Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, Naveen Patnaik-led Biju Janata Dal in Odisha and Shiv Sena had come out in support of Murmu ahead of the election.

In all, 44 parties declared support for her and 34 for her rival but several MLAs reportedly cross-voted for NDA's candidate.

Opposition parties picked 84-year-old Sinha, a former Union Minister who walked out of the BJP to join the Trinamool Congress, after Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar, former governor Gopal Krishna Gandhi and former Jammu and Kashmir chief Minister Farooq Abdullah declined on contest the election.

Also read | MC Explains: The fascinating air travel of Mr Ballot Box for presidential polls

Residents in Odisha's Rairangpur, the hometown of Murmu, have sweets ready. A tribal dance and victory procession is also on the cards, an NDTV report said.

The BJP has made elaborate plans to celebrate the victory of Murmu, who served as a minister in her home state of Odisha and was also the governor of Jharkhand.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is expected to visit Murmu at her temporary lodgings in the national capital’s Teen Murti Marg once the result is announced, sources said.

The Delhi BJP has planned a road show from the party headquarters in New Delhi to the Rajpath. State units, too, have plans for victory processions.

The electoral math 

The counting will be preceded by sorting, in which votes of MPs and MLAs will be separated. The value of the vote of each MP is fixed at 700, while those of MLAs vary from state to state.

The winner of the presidential election is not the person who gets the maximum votes but the person who gets votes above a certain quota.

So, after calculating the total value of votes polled by each candidate, the returning officer adds up the value of all valid votes. The quota is determined by dividing the sum of valid votes by 2 and adding one to the quotient.

If, for example, the total value of valid votes is 1,00,001. The quota required for getting elected will be calculated by dividing 1,00,001 by 2 and adding 1 to the quotient, i.e., 50,000.50 + 1 (.50 called the remainder is ignored). Thus, the quota will be 50,000 + 1 = 50,001.

In case no one gets more votes than the quota, the candidate with the lowest number of votes is eliminated.

President Ram Nath Kovind’s term ends on July 24 and his successor will take oath on July 25.

(With PTI inputs)