Like film industry, politics in India is all about gossip and speculation. And political reporting is all about kite flying – writing gossip based on imagination or hearsay. Sometimes, it is also about planting stories, as the situation demands.
One of the speculations doing rounds in the last few hours is that the Bharatiya Janata Party might push the candidature of Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu for the Prime Minister post, in the event of the party failing to get adequate numbers in the Lok Sabha elections, results of which will be declared on May 23.
According to this speculative report, Narendra Modi would opt out of the race, if the BJP fails to secure more than 200 seats.
Though the names of other top leaders line Nitin Gadkari or Arun Jaitely or even Rajnath Singh might be considered, the Sangh is expected to suggest the name of Venkaiah Naidu in order to secure the support of MPs from Andhra and Telangana.
Secondly, Venkaiah is soft-spoken and can command respect from many allies, unlike Narendra Modi whom many of the NDA partners themselves do not like.
Well, these are all speculations as mentioned in the beginning. The possibility is very unlikely especially in the wake of the exit polls conducted by various agencies that predicted landslide victory for the BJP-led NDA!