Even as speculation remains rife over who will be allotted the seat next to Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Parliament, government sources say that Home Minister Rajnath Singh has been allotted that seat.
Rajnath getting that seat perhaps is an indication that he is the de-facto number two in the government. Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan will be announcing the seat allocation for the House soon.
Even though the Home Minister has traditionally been considered second to the PM in hierarchy, there was confusion since senior leader Arun Jaitley holds two big portfolios of Finance and Defence.
Mahajan is also facing a tricky situation in the House with regard to the seat allocation as the AIADMK, Trinamool Congress and BJD are not keen about the idea of sitting next to Congress.
Neither the AIADMK nor the Trinamool Congress and Biju Janata Dal appear to be willing to have seats in Lok Sabha along with Congress, the sources said. Officials concerned have held several rounds of meeting to sort out the matter and the decision is expected this week.
The 16th Lok Sabha has seen BJP winning majority on its own after a gap of three decades and the opposition has become a fragmented entity. While Congress has secured 44 seats in the 543-member House, AIADMK has 37, Trinamool Congress 34 and BJD 20 and there are a host of smaller parties in the opposition.
