Over 400 people vote at Russian Embassy in Delhi for Russian presidential election

This is the first time Russia has held a presidential election in three days

New Delhi:

The Russian Embassy in India said that for the ongoing presidential election, more than 400 Russian citizens voted at the polling station of the Russian Embassy in New Delhi in the first six hours of voting on Sunday.

The Russian Embassy in India posted on

🇷🇺 In the first 6 hours of voting, more than 400 Russian citizens cast their votes at Polling Station No. 8099 🇮🇳 of the Russian Embassy in New Delhi.#election2024pic.twitter.com/D1LDQNwgQY

— Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs 🇷🇺 (@mfa_ Russia) March 17, 2024

Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is running for president again as an independent candidate, held electronic votes in the presidential election on Friday, Russia’s TASS news agency reported.

Video released by the Kremlin showed Putin walking to a computer in his office, casting his vote, then smiling and waving to the camera. A notification that the vote had been successful then appeared on the computer monitor.

This is not the first time Putin has voted online. In past years, Russian presidents have held online votes on a single election day in the fall.

The ongoing vote in Russia’s presidential election marks the first time voting has been conducted online.

More than 3.5 million people voted online on the first day of the Russian presidential election, the TASS news agency reported, citing the electronic voting monitoring portal.

As of 7:28 pm local time, 28 regions in Russia have issued as many as 3,500,331 ballots to voters who applied to vote online. According to the TASS news agency, the turnout rate on the first day of the federal electronic voting platform was 73%.

The state agency reported that as many as 4.76 million people in Russia planned to vote on federal platforms, adding that people in Moscow could vote on the city’s own platform without applying for remote voting before voting.

More than 180 election experts from 58 countries are monitoring the Russian presidential election. According to the TASS news agency, the Russian Citizens’ Chamber of Commerce issued a statement on the Telegram channel saying that they were invited by the Russian Citizens’ Chamber of Commerce to witness the election.

The statement said: “At the invitation of the Russian People’s Council, 185 foreign election experts from 58 countries came to Russia to conduct independent public observations.” According to officials, the news was displayed in a 24-hour online live broadcast of the Central Election Observation Center.

Russia’s Federation Council, the lower house of the Duma, initially announced March 17 as the date for the presidential election. However, Russia’s Central Election Commission (CEC) later announced that the vote would be held within three days, from March 15 to 17.

The candidates vying with Putin for the country’s top job are Vladislav Davankov, Leonid Slutsky and Nikolai Kharitonov.

The New Democratic Party chose Vladislav Davankov to run for the top job, while Putin was a self-selected candidate. Leonid Slutsky of the Liberal Democratic Party and Nikolay Kharitonov, representing the Russian Communist Party, have also joined the race, TASS reported.

This is the first time Russia has held a presidential election in three days. Ella Pamfilova, head of Russia’s Central Election Commission, said people like this format because it gives them more opportunities to vote in the presidential election, TASS news agency reported.

Putin has served four terms as President of Russia. He was elected president of Russia in 2000 and was re-elected in 2004, 2012 and 2018, according to Al Jazeera. If he wins, Putin will stay in office for another six years thanks to a constitutional amendment extending his term. This will mark his fifth term. He may be up for a sixth term in 2030.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)