New Delhi, Jun 9 (PTI) The appointment of four new BJP state unit chiefs has raised speculation of a possible reshuffle in the party as well as in the Prime Minister Narendra Modi government which has completed 12 years in power.
The BJP team under the new national president Nitin Nabin, who took charge in January, is expected to be announced within this month, with sources suggesting that some holding positions in the government may move to the party.
The BJP recently announced new presidents in Punjab, Haryana, Tripura and Delhi.
In Delhi, Union minister Harsh Malhotra has been appointed as the state unit head while another Union minister Pankaj Chaudhary was appointed as president of the Uttar Pradesh unit in December 2025.
Two Union ministers, Ravneet Singh Bittu and George Kurian, have not been renominated for the June 18 Rajya Sabha elections even though their tenures are coming to an end soon.
It is suggested that Bittu will concentrate on next year’s assembly election in Punjab. The BJP is likely to assign a key role to Bittu, whose Rajya Sabha tenure is ending this month.
Sources said that with the completion of 12 years of the BJP-led NDA government and the second year of its third term, Prime Minister Modi may effect a reshuffle in his ministry sometime soon.
Referring to the coming Punjab election, the sources said tackling the drug menace, religious conversions and “stalled” economic growth in the border state will prominently figure in the BJP’s poll planks in next year’s assembly elections there.
According to sources, the BJP will also firmly raise in its campaigns the issue of corruption and the “deteriorating” law and order situation in the wake of murders and the rise of gangsters under the Bhagwant Mann government while seeking to dislodge the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) from power in the state.
Assembly elections in Punjab are slated early next year and the BJP is leaving nothing to chance to wrest the border state from AAP.
“We will contest Punjab elections on the issue of conversion, drugs and stalled economic growth,” a source in the party said.
Party sources indicated that the BJP will go alone in the Punjab assembly polls. In the past, the BJP had an alliance with the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), which moved out of the coalition following differences over the three farm laws which were later withdrawn.
The BJP has already begun preparations for the 2027 Punjab elections with Home Minister Amit Shah sounding the poll bugle at a “badlav” rally in Moga in March. He launched a broadside against the Mann government at the rally, highlighting issues of law and order, drug menace, religious conversion and corruption.
After its convincing victory in West Bengal, the BJP’s focus has now shifted to Punjab, where it recently appointed Kewal Singh Dhillon, a Jat Sikh, as the party’s state unit chief.
Dhillon, a two-time former Congress MLA from Barnala, had joined the BJP in 2022 and was subsequently appointed vice president of the state unit of the party.
The BJP is reaching out to voters in Punjab while urging them to give it a chance to bring about a perceptible change in the border state, which had once led on the economic front.
Sunil Jakhar, who was replaced by Dhillon as the Punjab BJP president, may also be given some key responsibility in the state, according to sources.
The party is currently scouting for its candidates in key constituencies ahead of elections and is conducting a ground survey in this regard, the sources said.
Nabin is also expected to visit the state later this month to give a boost to the party’s campaign. PTI PK ACB ACB KSS KSS
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