Mumbai: All 16 ministers in Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel’s cabinet tendered their resignations Thursday, with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) looking to go to local polls, expected early next year, with a fresh cabinet in the state government.
Patel will induct a fresh council of ministers Friday 11.30 am, as per a statement from Raj Bhavan. Sources say, it will include some existing faces, and some new ones. Certain ministers with MoS rank like Harsh Sanghvi could also be elevated to cabinet rank, sources said.
Ministers, however, have not been given any indication of whether they are likely to be retained after the reshuffle. “Only the leadership knows that. We have no idea,” a minister who did not wish to be named said.
The reshuffle comes before local polls are scheduled in Gujarat in January-February 2026 across 15 municipal corporations, 81 municipalities, 31 district panchayats and 231 taluka panchayats.
The need for an overhaul
The BJP has been in power for seven straight terms in Gujarat, with the party having won a historic majority in the last election in 2022. The party stormed back to power with 156 seats in the 182-member house.
Now, ahead of the local body polls, which are being seen as a mini assembly poll, the BJP is looking to plug all its holes.
A BJP leader said, PM Modi feels that some amount of anti-incumbency always creeps in in any government, and Gujarat, which has almost become synonymous with the strength of the Union government, is too prestigious to put any possible anti-incumbency to test.
“Continuing to rejig its organisation, whether it is rotating MLAs or ministers, has been one of the BJP’s constant strategies to ensure its dominance in Gujarat,” Sarthak Bagchi, an academic at Ahmedabad University, told ThePrint.
He added, in 2016 the then CM Anandiben Patel was asked to resign, and a new council of ministers took over. In 2021 Vijay Rupani was asked to resign, and the same thing happened. This time, he said, it’s the same playbook, but with a change: The BJP is retaining the CM.
“He is a Patidar CM. Also he is someone with a benign image. He keeps a low profile. He is not seen as a threat by the leadership. Anandiben Patel and Vijay Rupani were not the same. Bhupendra Patel is very happy playing second fiddle to the central leadership and is also very close to the builder lobby that supports the BJP in Gujarat,” Bagchi said.
The BJP, which has held power in Gujarat for several terms now, has been facing challenges on several fronts in the state.
A state BJP leader who did not wish to be named said the state government has faced several controversies of late such as the Gambhira bridge collapse in Vadodara district in July this year, and the alleged irregularities in the MGNREGA scheme in Dahod, for which state minister Bachubhai Khabad’s sons were arrested in May this year.
“These incidents show there are inefficiencies in the administration. Bringing a fresh cabinet is the party’s way of showing people it is fixing these inefficiencies,” he said.
Another party leader said that none of the senior leaders have been able to build the goodwill among people that PM Modi has, and ministers have also fallen behind in countering the Opposition’s allegations.
The leader, however, said CM Patel’s own image remains positive.
Party leaders are also worried about narratives that the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is strengthening itself in Gujarat, especially in places like Surat and the Saurashtra region, and that the Congress is rebuilding its organisational base may hurt the BJP’s track record of complete dominance in Gujarat.
(Edited by Viny Mishra)
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