Regional entities will be merged into Modi entity.

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It's time for Narendra Modi. No 2nd option. Modi means Victory. Modi stands for new hope for India. Let's enter into a Modi Horizon in 2014.

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Getting poll arithmetic right: Narendra Modi needs to battle regional entities for national triumph

Ullekh N P | ET Bureau | New Delhi | Dec 18, 2013:: Like the Congress, the BJP too, is busy downplaying the challenge from the Aam Admi Party (AAP), terming it an "urban phenomenon" - in a country where nearly 200 of the 543 Lok Sabha seats are either urban or semi-urban thanks to delimitation and migration. The AAP may truly be just one of the myriad hurdles for the BJP's campaign spearhead Narendra Modi ahead of the 2014 general elections, which are expected to resemble an Olympics-like relay competition.

Modi has an edge over his rivals in what can be called the confidence quotient, especially among potential BJP voters and business houses. Infosys founder NR Narayana Murthy is among those who feel Modi will be acceptable as Prime Minister if he says sorry over riots that hit Gujarat under his watch in 2002. Modi's rivals are piqued that investment banks have begun to root for him as PM.

Goldman Sachs' pronouncement that Modi could be a change agent as PM invited the Congress' wrath. CLSA, Nomura and others, too, went on to heap praises on the "investor-friendliness" of the Gujarat chief minister.

"Alright, he has got his aspirational narrative right," concedes a Delhi-based Congress leader who regrets that his party has failed to enthuse investors, entrepreneurs and the industry.

But has the AAP which has given political entrepreneurship a new meaning and tapped the urban discontent hurt that image a bit?

Senior BJP leader Yaswant Sinha says the party is taking stock of the AAP's likely impact on the next elections. He is emboldened by poll triumphs in three of the five states in the recent assembly elections and hopes that 2014 will see the party overcoming its biggest handicap: territorial limitations.

Read the rest here. Courtesy: ET.

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