Onkar Singh in New Delhi/Rediff
New Delhi, Jul 21: United Progressive Alliance-Left presidential nominee Pratibha Patil took an early lead in the vote count for the presidential poll, which began in New Delhi on Saturday.
Going by the initial trends, the UPA-Left alliance is confident of the victory of their nominee Pratibha Patil.
Pratibha took an early lead in the presidential polls by bagging 423 votes in four states where counting was completed by 12.30 pm, picking up more than the expected votes in Andhra Pradesh and Assam.
She bagged 223 votes in Andhra Pradesh, while her NDA-backed independent rival Bhairon Singh Shekhawat got two votes from the BJP.
The value of an MLA's vote differs from state to state. In Andhra Pradesh, each vote has a value of 148.
In Arunachal Pradesh, where the Congress is in power, Patil bagged 58 votes while Shekhawat got one vote. The value of each MLA's vote in the state is eight.
In Assam, Patil polled 92 votes while Shekhawat got 20. Four votes in this state were declared invalid. The value of an MLA's vote in Assam is 116.
There was cross-voting, apparently by the AGP, in favour of Patil in Congress-ruled Assam, as the UPA-Left was expecting only 86 votes but got 92.
Fifteen of the 24 AGP legislators voted in the poll, defying their party's decision to abstain.
In Delhi, Patil bagged 50 of the 69 votes polled, while Shekhawat got 19 BJP votes. One BJP MLA did not vote. The value of a vote in Delhi is 58.
In Bihar, where a JD-U-BJP coalition is in power, Shekhawat bagged 145 votes while Patil received 89. Two votes were found to be invalid. The value of each MLA's vote in the state is 173.
Shekhawat got 51 votes in BJP-ruled Chhattisgarh, while Patil bagged 37. The value of each MLA's vote in this state is 129.
In Goa, where the Congress is in power, Patil won 25 votes while Shekhawat got 14. The value of a vote in the coastal state is 20.
In BJP-ruled Gujarat, Shekhawat bagged 123 votes while his opponent Patil got 57 votes. Two votes were found invalid. The value of vote in Gujarat is 147.
There was cross-voting in the state in Patil's favour as the BJP has 127 MLAs.
A rebel BJP MLA, who did not want to be identified, had claimed on polling day that some MLAs voted for Patil to register their protest against Chief Minister Narendra Modi's style of functioning.
In Congress-ruled Haryana, Patil received 74 votes while Shekhawat got seven. A vote has a value of 112 in Haryana.
In Jammu and Kashmir [Images], where a PDP-Congress coalition is in power, Patil received 77 votes while Shekhawat got just six. Two votes were found invalid.
The value of a vote in Jammu and Kashmir is 72.
P D T Achary, secretary of Lok Sabha, who is returning officer for conducting the polls, will announce the results by 2.30 and 3 pm.
Patil is expected to win by a margin of over 2.5 lakh votes over her rival.
In Thursday's polling, 682 MPs and 3,755 MLAs voted for the most bitterly-contested presidential election in the history of Independent India.
With PTI Inputs