Reflecting its southern ambitions, the ruling BJP on Monday picked Union Minister M Venkaiah Naidu as the party’s official candidate for the Vice-President’s post.

The BJP-led NDA coalition has a clear edge in the electoral college for Vice-President which comprises all members of Parliament. Naidu will be up against Opposition candidate and former West Bengal Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi.

The election for Vice-President is decided by the system of proportional representation, by means of a single transferable vote. Nominated members of Parliament are also eligible to be included in the Electoral College and, therefore, are entitled to participate in the election.

Of the 790 MPs, 245 are from the Rajya Sabha and 543 from the Lok Sabha.

July 18 is the last date for filing of nomination for the post of Vice-President. Polling will take place on August 5. Counting of votes will also be taken up on the same day.

The decision to field Venkaiah was taken by the BJP’s highest decision-making body, the parliamentary board, which met in the Capital soon after voting for the Presidential election got over on Monday. Prime Minister Narendra Modi presided over the meeting, which was attended by BJP President Amit Shah, and senior ministers Rajnath Singh, Arun Jaitley and Sushma Swaraj. Venkaiah will file his nomination on Tuesday.

Shah said Venkaiah was the “unanimous choice”.

The BJP President described him as the perfect choice, given his long political career and a parliamentary innings spanning 25 years.

“He is among our most senior leaders. Since 1970, he has been in public life. He was in the ABVP [the RSS’ student wing], was a prominent leader in the South connected to the JP movement. He was General Secretary and twice President of the BJP. Twice he was an MLA. He has been MP of the Rajya Sabha for four terms. For 25 years he has had a parliamentary career,” said Shah.

Southern stride Shah’s emphasis on Venkaiah’s southern origins underlined the “cowbelt party’s” ambitions for expansion into the region, where it performed better than ever in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, and then subsequently opened its account in Kerala.

The BJP contested 66 Lok Sabha seats in the southern States of Kerala, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana and won 21 of them, a strike rate of over 30 per cent. It improved its vote share in Kerala, where it upped its vote share from 3.95 per cent in 2009 to 10.3 per cent. In Andhra Pradesh, its vote share went up from 2.8 per cent to 8.5 per cent. In Karnataka, its vote share went up from 41.63 per cent to 43 per cent. It polled 5.5 per cent of the total votes in Tamil Nadu, over 2.3 per cent in 2009.

It forged alliances with the TDP in Andhra Pradesh and with the DMDK, PMK and MDMK in Tamil Nadu. It won one of the seven seats it contested in Tamil Nadu, and three of the 11 it contested in Andhra Pradesh. In Karnataka, the BJP won 17 seats.

In the 2016 Kerala Assembly elections, the BJP stitched together an alliance with Ezhava outfit BDJS, tribal activist CK Janu’s party and the PC Thomas-led faction of the Kerala Congress, to register an impressive vote share of 14.6 per cent. While veteran O Rajagopal was elected to the Assembly as the lone party MLA, the BJP came in second in six other seats.

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