NDA leaders had expected a resounding defeat once the United National Progressive Alliance -- the Third Front consisting of the All India Anna Dravid Munnetra Kazhagam, the Samajwadi Party and Telugu Desam Party among others -- decided to abstain from the election and not support Shekhawat.

"We knew he was facing defeat, but we had to go through the formalities of the contest. It was decided he would tender his resignation as vice-president once the results were officially communicated to him on July 21 by the returning officer," Surinder Singh Ahluwalia of the Bharatiya Janata Party, the NDA's leading component, told rediff.com

Shekhawat often consulted Ahluwalia during his campaign to be President.

The vice-president knew his chances of victory diminished after former prime minister Chandra Shekhar went into a coma from which he did not recover.

Chandra Shekhar was one of Shekhawat's closest friends even though they operated across different sides of the political spectrum. A fit Chandra Shekhar may have called in past favours and persuaded the Samajwadi Party, for instance, to vote for Shekhawat.

There is also a belief that the letter Chandra Shekhar wrote to other parties asking them to support Shekhawat's candidacy may not have been genuine.

"How can a man in a coma write a letter?" a senior journalist covering the BJP for almost a decade asked a BJP leader who merely smiled and walked away.

Shekhawat's much publicised discharge certificate while he was a policeman also came under scrutiny.

The entries were made on an electronic typewriter rather than by hand or a manual typewriter, as prevalent at the time Shekhawat left the police, in the early 1950s.

Those who know Shekhawat feel he won't be out of active politics for long, thereby increasing the problems for BJP President Rajnath Singh, who already has a tough time dealing with the L K Advani and Narendra Modi camps.