If the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) thought Narendra Modi’s decision to emerge from the ‘confines’ of Gujarat to the national stage would be a panacea ahead of the general elections, it could not have been more wrong.

And with the mercury set to only rise, as predicted by both meteorological officials and political pundits, this week is turning out to be particularly prickly for the main opposition party.

While long-time ally Nitish Kumar of JD(U) fired an open salvo on Sunday, setting the BJP a deadline of this yearend to finalise its prime ministerial candidate, and former ally Biju Patnaik of the BJD the following day clarified that his party would not support the NDA, another old ally is now raking up the PM candidate issue.

The Shiv Sena on Wednesday asked the BJP leadership to clear its stand on the issue of its prime ministerial candidate and demanded that a meeting of the NDA be convened soon to discuss the issue, PTI reports. While the Sena gave a clean chit to Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi over the 2002 riots in Gujarat, it hinted that Nitish Kumar’s discomfiture with Modi cannot be wished away.

By declaring “someone's candidature” (read Modi), there may be an increase of five to 10 seats for the BJP, but long-time allies, who have been with BJP faithfully for so many years, will go away, which will result in a loss of some seats, the Sena said.

Asking the BJP leadership to clear its stand on the prime ministerial candidate, an editorial in Shiv Sena mouthpiece 'Saamna' said, "There is a lot of confusion; there are several wannabes… There are squabbles within the NDA on the PM candidate issue. Rajnath Singh, LK Advani and Sushma Swaraj should comment on this and the confusion should be cleared by convening a meeting of the NDA at the earliest.”

On Modi, the editorial said Godhra riots were a reaction to the burning of Sabarmati Express at Godhra. "Had even Keshubhai Patel or Shankarsinh Vaghela been in Modi's place, the reaction would have been the same," the paper said.