Posted on 07/21/2007 7:52:39 AM PDT by ConservativeStatement
NEW DELHI - India elected Pratibha Patil as the country's first female president Saturday in a vote seen as a victory for the hundreds of millions of Indian women who contend with widespread discrimination.
Patil received 65.82 percent of the votes cast by national lawmakers and state legislators, said Election Commission head P.D.T. Achary. She had been widely expected to win.
Patil, the 72-year-old candidate of the governing Congress party and its political allies, defeated incumbent Vice President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, the candidate of the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
What position did Indira Ghandi hold?
The Prime Minister’s post.
In India, the president’s post is akin to the British queen’s post. Because India is a democratic republic, the British queen couldn’t be allowed to be the head of state, as is the case in Australia and Canada.
Most of the powers in the Indian system is in the hands of the Prime Minister and his/her selected Cabinet of Ministers.
Article says it is a ceremonial position and she was expected to win.Kind of like Hillary's coronation?
Oh. Then the Pres would be the one with the gavel in front of the Parliament. Like Pelosi or Reid.
While India has had several women in positions of power — most notably Indira Gandhi, who was elected to the more powerful position of prime minister in 1966, and her daughter-in-law, Sonia Gandhi_ many women still face rampant discrimination.
Ding ding ding, we have a winner. :-)
Mrs. Patil is a member of the Indian National Congress party and the United Progressive Alliance which is headed by Sonia Gandhi who is an Italian born Roman Catholic, the widow of assassinated former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. The United Progressive Alliance is a coalition of left leaning parties that runs all the way from communists and socialists to moderate pro-capitalism center-leftists.
The current Indian government is an unholy alliance of Maoists/Communists/Socialists and their useful idiot moderate lapdogs.
This article is so meaningless. True, Indira held the power position so it is not a “first female” anything.
Also, Benazir Bhutto was PM of Pakistan, a Muslim nation, when they still had a democracy. She is a Harvard and Oxford grad, and Phi Beta Kappa. Fellow students called her “Pinkie”
The media has its head up its hind-end most of the time
“The current Indian government is an unholy alliance of Maoists/Communists//Socialists and their useful idiot “
If there any idiot its the one between your ears.
IG was Prime Minister and this position is that of President. She IS India’s first President.
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