CP Radhakrishnan with PM Modi (Social Media)
National News:The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Sunday announced that Maharashtra Governor Chandrapuram Ponnuswamy (CP) Radhakrishnan will be the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) candidate for the post of Vice President. The decision was taken at the BJP Parliamentary Board meeting convened to finalize the nominee for the upcoming Vice Presidential election.
Radhakrishnan assumed office as the Governor of Maharashtra on 31 July 2024. Before this appointment, he served as the Governor of Jharkhand and also held additional responsibilities as the Governor of Telangana and the Lieutenant Governor of Puducherry.
Born on 20 October 1957 in Tiruppur, Tamil Nadu, Radhakrishnan graduated in Business Administration and began his public life as a volunteer of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). He began his political journey with the Bharatiya Jana Sangh, where he became part of the state executive in 1974.
By the mid-1990s, he had risen to prominence within the BJP. In 1996, he was appointed Secretary of the Tamil Nadu BJP, and two years later, he was elected to the Lok Sabha from Coimbatore. He retained his seat in the 1999 elections as well.
During his tenure in Parliament, Radhakrishnan headed the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Textiles. He also served on the Committee on Public Sector Undertakings and the Consultative Committee on Finance and was part of the Special Parliamentary Committee that investigated the Stock Exchange scam.
In 2004, he represented India at the United Nations General Assembly as a member of the parliamentary delegation and was also part of the country’s first parliamentary delegation to Taiwan.
From 2004 to 2007, Radhakrishnan held the position of President of the Tamil Nadu BJP. During this period, he embarked on a 93-day, 19,000 km ‘Rath Yatra’ to promote key issues such as river interlinking, the fight against terrorism, the need for a Uniform Civil Code, eradication of untouchability, and measures to tackle drug abuse. He also undertook two other statewide padayatras to raise public awareness on different issues.
In 2016, he was appointed Chairman of the Kochi-based Coir Board, a post he held for four years. Under his leadership, India’s coir exports achieved a record level of ₹2,532 crore. From 2020 to 2022, he served as the All-India in-charge of the BJP in Kerala.
Radhakrishnan was appointed the Governor of Jharkhand on 18 February 2023. Within the first four months of his tenure, he visited all 24 districts of the state and held direct interactions with citizens as well as officials. His proactive approach in the field was widely noted. In July 2024, he was given charge of Maharashtra, where he continues to serve as Governor until being nominated for the Vice Presidency.
Apart from politics and governance, Radhakrishnan has also shown keen interest in sports. He was a college-level table tennis champion and a long-distance runner and actively played cricket and volleyball. This sets the stage for CP Radhakrishnan, a veteran leader with over four decades of political experience, to contest the Vice Presidential election as the NDA’s official nominee.
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