• Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and exchanged views on regional and global developments, asserting the two countries stand united in the fight against terrorism.

• PM Modi congratulated him on assuming office as the Chancellor of Germany.

• Earlier in May, Conservative leader Friedrich Merz, 69, scored an absolute majority of 325 to 289 in the second secret vote in the lower house of Parliament to become the new leader of the country.

• Noting the “excellent progress” in the India-Germany Strategic Partnership over the past 25 years, the two leaders agreed to “work closely to further strengthen bilateral ties, including in the areas of trade and investment, defence and security, and innovation and technology”.

• Both leaders noted the positive contribution made by the Indian diaspora in Germany. It also said the two leaders exchanged views on regional and global issues of mutual interest.

German Parliament

• Germany is governed under the Basic Law, which is the constitution.

• The President is the head of the State and the Chancellor the head of the  government. 

• The President only holds a ceremonial role with limited reserve powers. For example, he or she can dissolve the Parliament if the Chancellor loses a motion of confidence and asks the President to do so.

• The Basic Law also enshrines the principle of the tripartition of powers into the executive, legislative and judicial branches.

• The executive power is vested in the Cabinet formed by the Chancellor and other ministers. 

• The Bundestag is the national parliament of Germany. Its seat is the Reichstag Building in Berlin. 

• The German Parliament is a bicameral legislature that consists of the elected Bundestag and the appointed Bundesrat (Upper House).

• To be elected as the Chancellor, the candidate has to obtain an absolute majority of votes in the Bundestag in order to receive the formal appointment from the President.

Elections to Bundestag (Lower House)

• The Bundestag is elected for a four-year term. 

• Voters cast their ballots at polling stations using official ballot papers. Voting machines are no longer used in Germany since the Federal Constitutional Court ruled on March 3, 2009 that the Federal Ordinance on Voting Machines was unconstitutional. 

• Voters cast two votes: the first for their representative in one of the 299 districts, the second for the party they want in parliament.

• All elected district candidates take a seat in parliament. At least 299 more seats are available to ensure that regardless of how many district representatives a party has, the overall balance in parliament reflects the distribution of second votes.

• The system starts to get complicated when Germans split their votes, meaning they vote for a candidate from one party in the first vote and for a different political party in their second vote. 

• That can throw off the balance of seats in parliament so that one party is more strongly represented than they should be based on the results of the proportionate second votes. 

• So, they created “overhang” and “balance seats”. Those are extra seats in the Bundestag that ensure every candidate who was directly elected gets a seat while political parties are still proportionally represented based on the number of votes they received.

• At present there are 736 members in the Bundestag.

• The distribution of seats in the Bundestag is proportional to the numbers of votes cast for the various parties. Seats are allocated first to the candidates who won the most first votes in the constituencies, before the remaining seats are allocated to the candidates on the party list in the states concerned, in the order in which they are listed.

Elections to Bundesrat

The Bundesrat (Upper House) is made up of 69 members appointed by 16 state governments. The states are called Länder. The number of seats for each state is based on the population size of a state, ranging from three to six seats.

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