'Congress raking PM candidate issue to divert nation's attention': Rajnath Singh

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President Rajnath Singh on Saturday challenged the Congress to declare its prime ministerial candidate, and alleged that the ruling party at the Centre is raking this issue to divert attention of the people from its shortcomings and failures.

"There has repeatedly been discussion with regard to the Prime Ministerial candidate. So, the biggest question at the moment is that the party whose government is in power should first declare as to who would be its Prime Ministerial candidate in the coming elections," Singh told mediapersons here.

"It should tell first, it is not an issue for the BJP. The Congress is raking up this issue to divert attention of the people from its shortcomings and failures," he added.

The BJP President had earlier on Friday challenged the Congress Party to declare its prime ministerial candidate

Singh, who was addressing members of the India-America Chamber of Commerce in New York, claimed that that there are too many contenders for the job in the Congress Party, including Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, Manmohan Singh, P. Chidambaram and other unnamed dark horses.

Asserting that there are no differences whatsoever in the choice of BJP's prime ministerial candidate, he said his party followed democratic principles in the selection of campaign committee and there was consensus unlike in the dictatorial Congress Party.

A section of BJP leaders, including actor-turned politician Shatrughan Sinha, are at the moment not pleased over the fact that party stalwart Lal Krishna Advani is being sidelined.

Moreover, Advani had earlier resigned from all party posts after Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi was appointed the chief of BJP's poll panel for the Lok Sabha polls. He was, however, forced to do a U-turn after RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat stepped in, and withdrew his resignation on June 11.