Heavyweight ballot box of UP refuses to open
Was it because of the fact that Uttar Pradesh has a number of political heavyweights, that the Presidential election ballot box from the state took some time to open?

After ballot boxes from the states were opened in alphabetical order during the counting of votes for the Presidential election here on Saturday, poll officials faced some difficulty in opening the box from UP, reports PTI from New Delhi. However, after some efforts the box could be opened and the counting began.

A journalist covering the counting exercise quipped, “it is because UP has lot of political heavyweights.”Of the 403 votes from the state, Patil got 251 while Shekhawat secured 52. Two votes were found invalid.
Samajwadi Party members had abstained from voting.

Shekhawat scores a duck in four states
NDA-backed Presidential nominee Bhairon Singh Shekhawat’s report card had a dismal look with the independent candidate failing to open his account in four states, reports PTI from New Delhi. Shekhawat scored a duck in the three Left-ruled states of West Bengal, Kerala and Tripura besides Mizoram.

While in Kerala, the UPA nominee got 132 votes, in West Bengal she got 256, in Tripura the former Rajasthan Governor got 51. In the other northeastern state of Mizoram, Patil got 14 votes.

In Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh, Shekhawat managed to get only one vote each as against Patil’s 7 and 8.
In Andhra Pradesh, Shekhawat got two votes compared to 148 for Pratibha Patil. In Puducherry, Shekhawat got three votes compared Patil’s 16.

7 Gujarat BJP MLAs goof up with votes
As many as seven BJP MLAs from Gujarat had either not voted for Bhairon Singh Shekhawat or cast invalid votes in the Presidential election, UNI reports from Ahmedabad.

In the 182-member Gujarat Assembly, there are 130 BJP members, 48 Congress members, 2 JD (U) members and 2 independents. However, Mr Shekhawat has secured 123 votes, while Pratibha Patil has got 57.
Two votes were held invalid.