Though the former Lok Sabha Speaker, Purno Agitok Sangma, who was fielded by the NDA-AIADMK-BJD in the recent presidential poll, claimed that he had the backing of the All India Tribal Council, he was able to manage just 9.64 per cent of the total votes from the MLAs of the eight northeastern hill States.
His rival and UPA nominee Pranab Mukherjee, who was declared elected as the President on Sunday, got as much as 87.75 per cent of the votes. There were around 2.61 per cent invalid votes (total 13 votes).
A quick look at the voting pattern showed that Mr. Sangma was able to get the support of 48 of the 498 MLAs in the region, whereas Mr. Mukherjee received 437 votes.
While Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura Legislative Assemblies have a strength of 60 members each, Assam has 126 members. Sikkim (32) and Mizoram (40) are the other States.
The only consolation is that in Meghalaya, where Mr. Sangma and his son are MLAs, he received the support of 23 of the 60 members. In Tripura, Sikkim and Manipur, he got one vote each; in Aunachal Pradesh, two votes, and in Mizoram, 7. In Nagaland, he drew a blank and in Assam, Mr. Sangma obtained the votes of only 13 of the 126 members in the Assembly.
Mr. Sangma obtained the highest votes of MLAs of Madhya Pradesh — 156, against Mr. Mukherjee’s 73 votes (total membership 230). This was followed by Tamil Nadu, which gave Mr. Sangma 148 votes against Mr. Mukherjee’s 45 (234) and Gujarat — Mr. Sangma, 123, Mr. Mukherjee, 59 (182).
In Mr. Mukherjee’s case, he got the record-breaking support of 351 members of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly, against Mr. Sangma’s 46 (total membership 403).
This was followed by West Bengal, where the President-elect got 275 votes and Mr. Sangma, just three votes (294), and Maharashtra — Mr. Mukherjee, 225, Mr. Sangma, 47 (288).
