Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee was today named the UPA candidate for the President's post as the TMC-SP combine, which had proposed A P J Abdul Kalam as their nominee, appeared to have broken in a significant gain for the ruling coalition.
Ending months of speculation, the ruling coalition met at the residence of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and its Chairperson Sonia Gandhi put forward the name of the 77-year-old veteran Congressman from West Bengal as its candidate, which was unanimously approved by the leaders of the constituent parties.
Reading out from a statement, Gandhi said, Pranab Mukherjee has a long and distinguished record of public service spanning over five decades.
"There is broad support for his candidature. The UPA appeals to all the political parties and all MPs and MLAs to support the candidature of Mukherjee for the office of President," she said.
Significantly, the UPA announcement was immediately greeted by Samajwadi Party and its arch rival in Uttar Pradesh BSP, who both extended their support to Mukherjee.
The SP backing to the UPA candidate signals a break with its new-found ally Trinamool Congress along with which it had only on Wednesday proposed the names of Kalam, Manmohan Singh and Somnath Chaterjee as their candidate to counter Congress choice of Mukherjee.
Ramgopal Yadav, senior leader of the SP, which had virtually gone quite after the initial announcement of choosing Kalam, declared that his party supported Mukherjee as President. "I am very happy that Pranab da has been finally nominated for the candidate for the biggest office. The party supports him and wishes him well for the victory," Yadav, brother of SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav, said.
Similarly, BSP supremo Mayawati pledged her party's backing for the Congress veteran, saying he is the most able candidate of all those announced. "Our party has decided to vote in favour of Pranab Mukherjee," she said at a press conference in Lucknow, shortly after UPA's announcement.