Ram Nath Kovind reaches out to all: Prez is above politics'

New Delhi: In a show of strength, 15 chief ministers, including two from non-NDA parties, along with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, BJP president Amit Shah, Union ministers and NDA leaders accompanied the ruling alliance’s presidential nominee Ram Nath Kovind, 71, as he filed his nomination papers on Friday for the July 17 election. The Opposition bloc has named former Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar against Mr Kovind. With the numbers favouring Mr Kovind, he will be the first BJP leader to occupy the nation’s highest constitutional post. President Pranab Mukherjee’s term ends on July 24. Mr Kovind will also be the second dalit to occupy the office after K.R. Narayanan, who was at Rashtrapati Bhavan from 1997 to 2002.

Interestingly, BJP ally and key NDA constituent Shiv Sena, whose leaders had seconded Mr Kovind’s name in the nomination papers, was not represented on the occasion at Parliament House, which the ruling party said was due to “some miscommunication”. The chief ministers of two non-NDA non-UPA outfits — Tamil Nadu’s E.K. Palaniswami and his Telangana counterpart K. Chandrasekhar Rao — were also present.

Representatives of Bihar CM Nitish Kumar-led JD(U) and the Jagan Mohan Reddy-ed YSRCP, who are supporting Mr Kovind, were also not present. However, a representative of the BJD, Odisha’s ruling party, was present when Mr Kovind filed his nomination.

Veteran BJP leaders L.K. Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi also accompanied the NDA nominee. PDP president and J&K chief minister Mehbooba Mufti and Goa chief minister Manohar Parrikar, who is down with viral fever, could not attend the ceremony. Both had told the BJP leadership. The NDA leaders also held a meeting attended by the PM ahead of Mr Kovind filing his nomination papers.

After filing his nomination, Mr Kovind  reached out to the Opposition parties and said that the post of President was above party politics and that he would strive to maintain its dignity. To seek support, Mr Kovind will be visiting almost every state, accompanied by a senior BJP leader. His first visit will be to his home state, Uttar Pradesh, on June 25, where senior BJP leader and Union minister Nitin Gadkari will be accompanying him.

“Ever since I became governor, I don’t belong to any political party. The post of President is above party politics. I am thankful to everybody for their support... I will do my best to maintain the dignity of the high office of President,” said the NDA candidate after filing his nomination as he sought support from all members of the electoral college. Mr Kovind named several former Presidents to cite the “great traditions” of the office and stressed that the Constitution was supreme. “That its supremacy is maintained is very important,” he added.

Mr Kovind pledged that he would work for the country’s “all-round development, fulfilment of youths’ aspirations and encouragement to modern education”.

Reading from a prepared text, he said: “I will strive to see to it that the dream to build a new India which is developing continuously when we celebrate 75 years of Independence in 2022 is fulfilled.” He added that India is the “largest and greatest” democracy and thanked parties that had supported his candidature.

The BJP claimed Mr Kovind will win by an “absolute majority”, with UP chief minister Yogi Adityanath saying the Opposition had fielded Ms Meira Kumar to divide dalits to “save their skin”. He added: “The intentions of the Opposition are not honest towards dalits, otherwise they would have fielded Kumar last time.”

Three sets of nomination papers were filed in support of Mr Kovind’s candidature, Prime Minister Modi and Mr Advani being among the 60 proposers in one. One set of papers, in which Mr Shah was among the proposers, was in Hindi, that some BJP leaders said was a rare practice. A fourth set will be filed on June 28, the last date of the filing of nominations.