All opinion polls are talking about Modi becoming the winner. In such a political scenario, new equations are being formed and those with deep pockets are falling over each other to donate to the BJP. Be it Team Modi, Amit Shah, the party president Rajnath Singh, former president Nitin Gadkari, Ananth Kumar and party’s Treasurer Piyush Goyal, there is a stampede to give money to the party. Matters have come to such a state that different places are being found to keep that money. On the other hand, the Congress is sad that although all the allegations of scams and corruption have been levelled against the Congress but it does not have sufficient funds for the elections. So much so that the Congress is unable to give money to its candidates to contest the elections.

With the biggest democratic game about to play out in the form of India’s general elections, political colours are doing the rounds. The tesu flowers are in bloom and Palashvan gives everything a fiery hue. Slogans and speeches are reverberating all over and at a time like this, all political parties and their e-armies are eyeing the internet. New funny videos are being made and are going viral at a fast speed, getting “hits” by the lakhs in a few moments. Clever ways are being devised to poke fun at the opponent parties. For instance, Rahul Gandhi in short pants and his election advert – “Har haath lollipop” is becoming a hit. In reply, under their “Dhol ki pol” strategy, Congress planners are hammer and tongs after Modi under this “Chai par charcha” video and it is becoming extremely popular. The video is also a hit on YouTube. The AAP has also joined the e-fight; the videos that have been made in favour of AAP come with a statutory warning “Protect your mental balance from run-of-the-mill debates, go slap the nearest Gandhi or NaMo follower. In the AIB-produced “AAP key aam, guthliion ke daam”, the meanings of Kejriwal’s body language have been decoded. In the dharna dance video, an interesting rap song has been based on Kejriwal. “Nayak to the common man” is a humorous take on the how Kejriwal became Kejriwal and how the Aam Aadmi Party came about. Pappu, Feku and fekriwal’s tweets, jokes, videos and creating new records on YouTube,Facebook and Twitter. This may be a new tradition in the Indian elections scenario, it is common for such videos to go viral in Western countries, especially America and England. Similar viral videos and internet memes created waves in the 2008 and 2012 elections for the American president. Now the story is being repeated in the Indian General Elections as well.

Hardcore Samajwadi  leader Sharad Yadav and Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar have taken their fight into the streets now. As a result, the colour was a tad jaded at Sharad Yadav’s Holi-Milan event organised on Friday in New Delhi’s at Ram Sundar Das’ residence. Along with the BJP, 138 well-known people were invited but no known person was spotted, only a handful of media people came, too. So much so that Sharad Yadav himself was not present at the event, and neither was Nitish there. The fight started with Sharad Yadav’s Madhepura’s seat; Nitish wants him to contest from Nalanda. His logic is that because Pappu Yadav is contesting from Madhepura on Lalu’s ticket, things have come tougher for Sharad from there. Sharad Yadav’s logic was, “If I go to Nalanda, I will lose for sure. I am a Khanti Samajwadi and will contest from Madhepura only.” Both Sharad and Nitish got into a heated argument in Patna during a meeting and matter came to such a state that Sharad threatened in anger, “Now there will neither be a JD (U) nor the Nitish government.” It is worth mentioning here that Bihar Assembly has 243 members and after the split from the BJP, Nitish has 118 members left and he is running the government with the support of some independent and Congress MLAs. Thus, if now Sharad walks out with his dozen supporters, and leaves Nitish, his government is bound to be in trouble. In any case, Sharad’s ace supporter Narendra Singh is against Nitish. Thus, when Sharad left the Patna meeting midway and returned to Delhi, Nitish followed him to the Capital and tried to pacify him until 3 in the morning on Friday. 

Once considered to be completely against Narendra Modi, Bihari saffron leader Sushil Modi has also changed his colours. He has come forward in a new political avatar and is busy praising NaMo to the high heavens. However, Sushil Modi’s ardent support to Modi has meant voices are being raised against his change of face and allegations are being made about some transactions taking place during the distribution of BJP tickets. Such allegations are also being made against another BJP leader Mangal Pandey. Sushil Modi is eyeing the chief minister’s chair in Bihar and he has already started to get important and influential leaders in the party to his side. It is being said that it was Sushil Modi’s idea that Ravi Shankar Prasad should contest the elections from Patna Saheb seat instead of Shatrughn Sinha. Shatru, too, has declined contesting from Delhi and told the party High Command that he will contest elections only from Patna Saheb, or not at all .Finally, Shatru got the ticket from Patna Saheb , even after the plank made by Sushil Modi.

General V K Singh turned down the offer of contesting the elections from Bhivani-Mahendra Garh because he realised that the views of Jat voters about him  was not positive. And if he doesn’t get the support from Jats or Brahmins, he might find it difficult to win the seat. So the General made it clear to prominent party leaders that he wants to contest the elections from Rajput-dominated seat Jodhpur in Rajasthan instead of Haryana. But the BJP’s difficulty is that party’s veteran leader Jaswant Singh also wanted to contest from there. So now the Rajnath-Gadkari duo is trying to figure out if the General should rather be sent to the Rajya Sabha. 

Lucknow’s BJP  MP Lal Ji Tandon may be facing trouble because his constitutency has slipped to the Rajnath’s lap, but he surely is setting the benchmark on how politicians should dress up. Lal Ji Tandon has a big kurta shop in Lucknow and it sees good sales. It is said that no other kurta shop is as famous. Thus, on the politicians’ demand, Lal Ji has started a branch in New Delhi’s Yashwant Place. The minute the shop opened,Delhi politicians are thronging the shop, even though they are adept at tearing kurtas, too.

Former Central Minister Kalpnath Rai’s son-in-law Muktinath Upadhyaya was once an advisor to the likes of Lalu Yadav and Shibu Soren. He was also instrumental in planning a strategy in Jharkhand in 2004, when he was the National Secretary of Jharkhand Mukti Morcha. But it seems nowadays that Muktinath ji is trying to burn his own lamp in a saffron way. In keeping with his strategy, sources reveal that he is working on a closer friendship with Narendra Modi. Thus, when Modi arrived in Hotel Ashok in Capital  for a meeting with women under the “Chai par charcha”, he met Muktinath face to face. Modi was getting off the lift and Mukti was in the lobby ready to get on it. When Modi saw Muktinath, he took him by the arm and went to a corner and talked for a long. All warm and fuzzy inside, Muktinath is now busy chanting NaMo’s name. 

The minute they got the whiff that BJP President Rajnath Singh may contest the elections from Lucknow constituency this time, Opposition parties started to play their games against him on the chessboard of political arena. Considering the number of Brahmin votes from the constituency, the Congress is considering Reeta Bahuguna Joshi to contest from there. The BSP is eyeing the seat and the party’s supremo Mayavati is looking at a chance to take revenge from Rajnath. Behenji is looking at launching a strong candidate from there. Only the SP is showing signs of friendship with the BJP president and is having a Muslim contest from Lucknow. But Rajnath camp is sure that the party president will benefit from his clean image and he will win the Lucknow seat without any hurdle. 

AAP’s chief Arvind Kejriwal is finally begun to change his colours. He is now starting to behave like the big leaders of the bigger parties. After his three-day controversial trip to Gujarat, he came back to Delhi to take part in the India Today Conclave in the capital on Friday. After speaking at the Conclave, he left for Jaipur on a chartered flight owned by Religare. When he was asked where the Aam Aadmi Party got the money to pay for the chartered flight, Kejriwal replied innocently, “The expenses for the flight were borne by the sponsors.” When the sponsors were asked about it, they chose to maintain a premeditated silence about it. 

When India’s most prominent Aam Aadmi Arvind Kejriwal was on his 1000-km road show and came out into the streets of UP, the sight was worth seeing. Arvind himself was in an Innova car, and wherever he felt like shaking hands with the public, he would jump into an open jeep. Advocating the rights and times of the common man and leading the fight for him, Arvind Kejriwal’s cavalcade included several gleaming cars of foreign make – a BMW, for instance. All cars displayed big stickers, there were billboards on both sides and wherever the crowd was dense, Kejriwal would dismount his car and where there was lesser, he moved on waving at the people. When the entire group reached a small town Auraiya, there were hardly 50 people there. As Kejriwal waved and the cavalcade moved forward, a young man in the group shouted, “Sir, at least get off the car for two minutes.” The answer: “There isn’t enough crowd to stop and say something.” Kejriwal moved ahead, the Aam Aadmi was left behind.