Former West Bengal governor Jagdeep Dhankar was sworn in as India’s 14th vice president at a ceremony in Rashtrapati Bhavan on Thursday. President Droupadi Murmu administered him the oath of office.
On Saturday, Dhankar, who was the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) nominee for the vice-presidential post, beat the opposition‘s candidate Margaret Alva by a margin of 346 votes.
As per data provided by the Lok Sabha Secretariat, out of 780 votes, 725 cast their ballot and Dhankar polled 528 votes while Alva got 182. There were 50 absentees and 15 votes were found invalid.
Dhankar, who will also be the chairperson of the Rajya Sabha, was born in Rajasthan’s Jhunjhunu and was a lawyer before switching to politics. He served as a minister of state for parliamentary affairs in 1990.
In 2019, he was appointed as the governor of West Bengal and had a rather turbulent equation with chief minister Mamata Banerjee. Prior to his swearing in, he paid tribute to Mahatma Gandhi at Rajghat.