Workers wearing Modi masks celebrate outside the BJP headquarters in New Delhi.
LK Advani is not attending a meeting of the BJP's parliamentary board, which is expected to announce this evening that
Narendra Modi will be the party's candidate for prime minister in 2014.
The 85-year-old Mr Advani is isolated now as the only top BJP leader opposing the Modi-for-PM announcement. Other dissenters like Sushma Swaraj and Murli Manohar Joshi have reportedly agreed to put up a united front at today's meeting and back a majority decision, though, sources said, they could record their reservation.
Mr Modi has landed in Delhi and is at the BJP headquarters, where his nomination is being discussed by 10 of the board's 12 members. Mr Modi is a member too but is not attending. (
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This afternoon, a little before he made a last effort at convincing Mr Advani, BJP president
Rajnath Singh called up ally Shiv Sena and informed it that Mr Modi will be nominated. The Sena has promised its support; another ally, the Akali Dal, has already said it favours fronting Mr Modi.
BJP leaders tried all day to bring around Mr Advani to prevent the embarrassment of his voting against the proposal to name Mr Modi presumptive PM. Word that he would not attend the meeting came after other leaders had gathered at the BJP headquarters, which has been extravagantly readied for post-announcement celebrations.
Mr Advani has reportedly told the BJP president that announcing Mr Modi as its choice for PM will plunge the BJP into "political disaster".
Mr Modi's detractors say the party should first test his appeal in the assembly elections in five states in November. But the BJP's ideological mentor, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh or RSS, believes that Mr Modi's surging popularity among party workers could extend to voters.
The fissures within the BJP's big hitters are allowing opponents to point out that Mr Modi polarises not just voters but his own party.
He is accused of being a divisive figure who deters minority voters because he failed to prevent the riots in Gujarat in 2002, in which hundreds of Muslims were killed on his watch.