BJP’s prime ministerial candidate L K Advani today asserted that the NDA would emerge as the largest alliance in the Lok Sabha polls. Expressing confidence about receiving the people’s mandate, Advani also claimed that the BJP would emerge as the single largest party.
Speaking to
reporters in Bangalore, Advani said he had toured about 80 Parliamentary constituencies and added, “It seems the single largest party in the Lok Sabha will be the BJP”. “Also it seems to me that the BJP along with its allies will be the largest alliance in Parliament,” he said, but declined to predict the numbers.
Replying to a question about his being called as “PM in waiting”, he said he was not happy with the phrase. Stating that NDA had lost the last elections due to “over confidence”, he said some of his colleagues did not appreciate the compulsions of coalition then, but now closer interaction had made them change their position.
Describing the 2009 polls as being crucial, he said he wished NDA had come to power in 2004. “We would have achieved a lot”, he said. Advani lamented the absence of senior leader A B Vajpayee during campaign due to ill-health. But one factor that gladdened his heart was that BJP had shed its “north India party” tag by coming to power in Karnataka.
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