Sushil Modi favours NaMo over Advani

The shift in balance of power within the BJP became glaringly evident when former Deputy Chief Minister of Bihar Sushil Kumar Modi openly came out against veteran leader L K Advani and pitched for an announcement in favour of Narendra Modi as the party’s prime ministerial candidate.

The shift in balance of power within the BJP became glaringly evident when former Deputy Chief Minister of Bihar Sushil Kumar Modi openly came out against veteran leader L K Advani and pitched for an announcement in favour of Narendra Modi as the party’s prime ministerial candidate.

“Advaniji has failed to gauge the public mood. Advaniji himself declared Atalji as PM candidate, now also he could have done the same for NaMo,” Sushil Modi wrote on Twitter on Wednesday night.

He went on to add: “Politics is the only profession in which people aspire till their last. Ministerial berth can resurrect a dead politician”

When asked why he has targeted “the tallest leader” of the party, he quipped: “There is no doubt that Advaniji is our mentor and we are inspired by him, but it’s a fact that there is strong mobilisation in favour of Narendra Modi.”’

Sushil Modi’s open endorsement is being seen to be a last-ditch attempt by a section of Narendra Modi supporters to get Advani to support Modi’s candidature in the parliamentary board meeting, without the situation degenerating into a full-fleged internal struggle.

But when Sushil Modi’s twittering had the opposite effect and created more controversy, he changed his tone a bit to admit that Advani “is hale and hearty and would serve party and nation for many more years”.

By way of explanation for muddying the waters, he explained that he had “used twitter as it is an independent forum for expressing our feeling”.

Interestingly, Sushil Modi was earlier considered to be a staunch supporter of Advani within the BJP. He never commented on Narendra Modi as the party’s possible prime ministerial candidate, though once he called Nitish as PM material.

But once he along with other 10 ministers of his party were sacked by CM Nitish Kumar on June 16, bringing an end to the 17-year-old JD(U)-BJP alliance, Sushil Modi’s tenor changed.

He went to the extent of collecting iron pieces from every panchayat of Nalanda district (native district of Nitish) to support Modi’s initiative to construct a gigantic statue of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel in Gujarat.

Earlier, when Narendra Modi was kept away from campaigning accommodating Nitish Kumar’s demand, Sushil Modi quietly went along. But in a changed political environment, everyone’s eager to go whole hog in support of Modi.

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