IANS

New Delhi, Jul 19: The weeks of vitriolic campaign for India's Presidential election gave way to banter and one-liners on Thursday as hundreds of MPs set aside their political rivalry to vote and conclude a battle whose most likely winner is expected to be ruling coalition nominee Pratibha Patil.

Members from the ruling United Progressive Alliance (UPA) and the opposition National Democratic Alliance (NDA), which is backing Vice-President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, greeted one another warmly and exchanged pleasantries as they stood in queue in the Parliament house to pick a new Head of State.

None of the animosity that marred the bitter campaign all these weeks was seen on Thursday.

Having surrendered their mobile telephones to Election Commission officials before forming a queue, the MPs had only one another to talk to. And they made full use of the opportunity, trying in the process to score light-hearted political victories.

Actor-turned-MP Vinod Khanna of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was in his elements as he turned to Priya Dutt of the Congress and said aloud: "Priya, you know who to vote for?" The daughter of the late Sunil Dutt just smiled before going into Room 62 to vote.

Railway minister Lalu Prasad, dressed in his impeccable white kurta, came in with BJP's Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, both men smiling for the cameras. As Lalu raised his right hand to show a victory sign, Naqvi promptly followed suit, with the minister immediately patting him on his back.

Prime minister Manmohan Singh and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi were among the first to vote once balloting opened at 10 am. Both left in no time, the Prime Minister greeting any MP who came his way in his usual affable manner.

As minister of state for external affairs E Ahamed got out of his car with a slight limp, the result of a fall he suffered in the Gulf some weeks ago, many journalists wanted to know what happened. Prompt came the reply: "You are coming to see me now! I got this injury much earlier!"

When a reporter told Suravaram Sudhakar Reddy of the Communist Party of India that the UPA had erred in picking the controversy-plagued Patil as its Presidential candidate, the Andhra Pradesh MP answered: "We will talk about it later."

The authorities enforced an additional measure to keep away the large number of journalists who hold passes that gives them access to Parliament. Only those armed with Election Commission cards could get near Room 62. Others had to watch the proceedings from a distance.

Several MPs reached Parliament even before the start of the voting. Within an hour, the place was crowded and the queue, which was until then moving rapidly, took a serpentine shape.

All of them held their voting cards. Election Commission officials earlier checked their identity cards.

"It was a very smooth process and it took three to four minutes for us to vote. We had to mark the ballot paper with the names of candidates. We were not allowed to carry our mobile phones," Congress member KV Thangabalu told IANS later.

Conspicuous by their absence were members of the Samajwadi Party and Telugu Desam Party (TDP) that had decided to keep away from the election to protest against the candidates. But MPs from the AIADMK, which had taken a similar decision, turned up, surprising everyone.

Many of the AIADMK MPs had their leader J Jayalalitha's photograph pinned to their chest.

The young Sachin Pilot of the Congress told IANS: "The whole atmosphere was relaxed. Many of us had not met for sometime and this gave us an opportunity to exchange notes while we stood in the line to vote.

"The result being a foregone conclusion, MPs belonging to NDA too were in a lighter mood."

But there was no holding Minister for Women and Child Development Renuka Choudhury, who hit out at the TDP for staying away from the battle of ballot.

"They (Third Front of which TDP is a member) are unemployed and have nothing to do," she told everyone in sight.

Gurudas Dasgupta of the CPI strongly defended Patil while interacting with journalists. "There is nothing wrong with her. She is a woman candidate. We are putting up a woman for the first time."

As usual former cricketer Navjot Singh Sidhu of BJP had the last word. "What is morally not correct is politically not correct," he remarked. "They (UPA) should listen to their conscience." For once, no one was listening to him.