Election of Vice President equally important

The present incumbent Hamid Ansari, who served two terms from 2007 to 2017, will be competing his term in August 2017. 

The office of the Vice President was borrowed from the American Political system by the framers of the Constitution. While the Crown of England was replaced with the office of President of India, the vice president was from the US.  In the US the Vice President is elected along with the President and he is known as the running mate of the President of US. It is the prerogative of the President to choose the candidate for Vice President in the US. There are endless jokes about the office of Vice President in the US such as when John Adams was the first US Vice President, serving under George Washington. He said the vice presidency was the “most insignificant office” ever. Thomas Marshall served as Vice President from 1913 to 1921. He joked: “Once there were two brothers. One ran away to sea; the other was elected Vice President of the United States. And nothing was heard of either of them again.” 

In our country, both are elected separately and by different electoral colleges.  While the President is elected by the members of the Union and State legislatures, the Vice President is elected by the members of both Houses of Parliament, including the nominated members (two in LS and 12 in Rajya Sabha), so the total number of votes are 790.  

In US, when the President passes away, automatically the Vice President becomes the President and completes the term for which the  president is elected. In India the Vice-President succeeds the President in case of eventualities, but he can hold office only for a brief time, until the new president is elected. Many who served as Vice-presidents have become Presidents like Sarvepalli Radhakrishan (1952-62), Zakir Hussain (1962-67), VV Giri (1967-69) R. Venkatraman (1984-87), Shankar Dayal Sharma (1987-92) and KR Narayanan (1992-97). Only two Vice Presidents had the fortune of serving two terms -Sarvepalli Radhakrishan (1952-62) and Hamid Ansari (2007-2017). Nilam Sanjeeva Reddy, Giani Zail Singh, ABJ Abdul Kalam, Pratibha Patil and Pranab Mukherjee were all elected directly as the President of India.

Functions of the Vice President are what the framers of the Constitution of India borrowed from the US. In both the countries, he is the Chairman of the Upper House (The Senate in the US and the Rajya Sabha in India) and in both the countries the Vice President is the first in line in the succession. The role of the Vice President is limited, but the Vice President is supposed to be a neutral person in our political system. As Chairman of the Rajya Sabha, he plays a role similar to the Speaker in the Lok Sabha. As it is a secret ballot, the members of both houses have all the freedom to choose the candidate of their choice.