RSS man C.P. Radhakrishnan to be 15th vice-president of India

Strongly rooted in the RSS and the BJP, Chandrapuram Ponnusamy Radhakrishnan was on Tuesday elected the 15th vice-president of India, the third leader from Tamil Nadu to occupy the coveted post. He polled a total of 452 votes as opposed to 300 polled by his rival and INDIA bloc candidate B. Sudershan Reddy, in a high-stakes election.

Seen as a soft-spoken and non-confrontational leader, the 67-year-old Radhakrishnan succeeds Jagdeep Dhankhar, who resigned as vice president on 21 July, taking everyone by surprise.

Described as a 'pachai Tamizhan' (true-blue Tamil) by well-wishers, Radhakrishnan was serving as governor of Maharashtra when he was named as vice-presidential nominee of the BJP-led NDA.

A two-term member of the Lok Sabha from Coimbatore during the tenure of late Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Radhakrishnan came close to becoming a Union minister, but had to lose out to fellow Tamilan Pon Radhakrishnan in 1998 after some confusion over his name by the then floor managers of the BJP.

Radhakrishnan joined the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) as a teenager and rose through the ranks in the organisation and later in the BJP, gaining acceptability in the party and the state.

A member of the socially dominant and economically prosperous Kongu Vellalar Gounder community, he became the secretary of the BJP's Tamil Nadu unit in 1996 and served as the party's state unit president between 2003 and 2006.

Radhakrishnan brings along a rich political and administrative experience, which will prove handy in his role as the vice-president, who is also the ex officio chairman of the Rajya Sabha.

Radhakrishnan is considered an untainted leader with rich political and administrative experience, which should prove useful as chairman of the Rajya Sabha.

The Tamil Nadu leader is said to be held in high esteem across party lines in his state, resulting in the BJP giving him multiple gubernatorial assignments in Jharkhand, Telangana, Maharashtra and Puducherry.

Radhakrishnan's candidature also seeks to disarm the Opposition of a key political narrative, as he is the first OBC leader from South India to be named for the vice-president's office.

An official profile circulated by the NDA projects Radhakrishnan as a leader who is eminent, knowledgeable and untainted by any legal accusations.

Radhakrishnan's political innings started with his association with organisations such as the RSS and the Jan Sangh. He took up student politics and has since used politics as a medium to serve the people.

He was sworn in as the governor of Maharashtra on 31 July 2024. Before this, he served as the governor of Jharkhand for nearly one-and-a-half years.

Born on 20 October 1957 at Tiruppur in Tamil Nadu, Radhakrishnan has a bachelor's degree in Business Administration. Starting as an RSS swayamsevak at the age of 16, he became a state executive committee member of the Bharatiya Janasangh in 1974.

Between 2004 and 2007, Radhakrishnan served as the Tamil Nadu BJP president. In this role, he undertook a 19,000-km 'Rath Yatra' that lasted for 93 days.

The yatra was organised to highlight his demands for the linking of all Indian rivers, eradicating terrorism, implementing a uniform civil code, removing untouchability and combating the menace of narcotic drugs, some of the key planks of the BJP and the RSS.

With PTI inputs