New Delhi:
Outgoing BJP President Nitin Gadkari today alleged that there was a "political conspiracy" to tarnish his image and, therefore, in the interest of the party, he had proposed the name of
Rajnath Singh for the party's top post.
"As far as the election for the second term is concerned, there was a political conspiracy to link me to an issue with which I had no direct or indirect involvement. After that, there were false allegations one after the other. Yesterday also, there was an attempt of this sort (sic)," he told reporters on Wednesday.
Mr Gadkari said that when he felt that there was a conspiracy to harm the party by tarnishing his image, he asked his colleagues to look for someone else to lead the BJP. "He (
Rajnath Singh) is a leader of stature. He has done good work as Uttar Pradesh chief minister. He is steadfast in the ideology of our
parivar and he can lead us to victory in 2014. So, I proposed his name. And everybody, from Advani
ji to Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley, supported," he said.
Maintaining that the party's interest should be placed higher than that of an individual, he thanked LK Advani and other party leaders for their support during his tenure as BJP chief.