Ans.
·
52. There shall be a President of India.
·
53. (1) The executive power of the Union
shall bevested in the President and shall be exercised by himeither directly or
through officers subordinate to him in accordance with this Constitution.
·
54. The President shall be elected by the
members of an electoral college consisting of—
·
the elected members of both Houses
ofParliament; andthe elected members of the LegislativeAssemblies of the
States.
Although Article 53 of the Constitution of India states that the
President can exercise his or her powers directly or by subordinate authority,
with few exceptions, all of the executive authority vested in the President
are, in practice, exercised by the popularly elected Government of India,
headed by the Prime Minister. This Executive power is exercised by the Prime
Minister with the help of the Council of Ministers.
·
The President of India resides in an estate in
New Delhi known as the Rashtrapati Bhavan (which roughly translates as
President's Palace). The presidential retreat is The Retreat in Chharabra,
Shimla and Rashtrapati Nilayam (President's Place) in Hyderabad.
·
The 13th and current President is Pranab
Mukherjee, who was elected on 22 July 2012, and sworn-in on 25 July 2012. He is
also the first Bengali to be elected as President. He took over the position
from Pratibha Patil, who was the first woman to serve in the office.
·
India achieved independence from the British
Rule on 15 August 1947, initially as a Dominion within the Commonwealth of
Nations with George VI as the king of India, represented in the country by a
governor-general. Still, following this, the Constituent Assembly of India,
under the leadership of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, undertook the process of drafting a
completely new constitution for the country. The Constitution of India was
eventually enacted on 26 November 1949 and came into force on 26 January 1950,
