Manmohan Singh, Mulayam Singh Yadav arrive in wheelchair to cast vote

New Delhi: Former prime minister Manmohan Singh on Monday arrived in Parliament to cast his vote for the presidential poll in a wheelchair.

Singh, 89, has been unwell after he tested positive for Covid last year, and has been away from the limelight since then.

Last October, he was admitted to the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) after he complained of weakness following fever. The former PM had contracted Covid last year during the height of the second coronavirus wave.

Voting for the presidential election in which NDA candidate Droupadi Murmu is pitted against joint Opposition pick Yashwant Sinha began at 10 am and Prime Minister Narendra Modi was among the first to cast his vote followed by BJP President JP Nadda.

The voting process would conclude at 5 pm.

Another veteran leader, Samajwadi Party founder Mulayam Singh Yadav, also arrived to cast his vote on a wheel chair accompanied by his brother Ram Gopal Yadav.

Yadav, 82, has been unwell for quite some time and has been in an out of hospital in the last year due to various ailments.

BJP leader Pradipta Kumar Naik, who is the leader of opposition in the Odisha Assembly also arrived on a wheel chair with an oxygen cylinder straight from the hospital.

He was admitted to a private hospital here for post-Covid complications.

While 616 MPs and nine MLAs cast their vote here till 1pm, they recorded a voting percentage of 83 per cent.

Counting of votes will be held on July 21.