In a big development and showing government’s full control, Senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Venkaiah Naidu, filed his nomination papers for the vice-presidential election on Tuesday. He thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi and allies for extending their support to his candidature. The BJP’s parliamentary board had on Monday picked Naidu as the NDA’s nominee for the post of Vice-President. The Vice President election is all slated to be held on August 5 and Naidu will face Opposition candidate Gopalkrishan Gandhi, in the race.
Naidu was accompanied by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, BJP president Amit Shah, senior leader Murli Manohar Joshi and other party legislators at the time of nomination.
In an interesting and unique development, Naidu left his parent BJP and his ministries.
“I am honoured to be nominated for the post of vice-president. I have been actively engaged in public life for over four decades. The Office of Vice President is a different profile, has its functional norms. Hope I will be able to do justice,” the BJP veteran said.
An emotional Naidu said, “”Now I do not belong to any party. I lost my mother at a very young age and treated my party as my mother and they brought me up to this level. Its painful to leave the party. I am feeling emotional at this juncture.” “I am grateful to PM Narendra Modi, Amit Shah, BJP stalwarts and other parties for reposing faith and confidence in me by nominating for the vice-president post. I am looking forward to doing justice to the nomination,” Naidu said while addressing a press conference after filing his nomination papers today.
In his concluding remarks, Naidu said “I wanted to see PM Narendra Modi come back to power in 2019 and after that, I wanted to resign from active politics. But destiny has other plans for me,”
Source: Zee News