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BJP to name Amit Shah’s successor as party chief in 6 weeks, JP Nadda top choice

The new BJP chief will be elected in the last week of December, after the ongoing organisational polls are completed.

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New Delhi: In about the next six weeks, Home Minister Amit Shah will relinquish the charge as the national president of ruling BJP after nearly six years of being in command.

J.P. Nadda, the working president of the party and former Union minister, is set to replace Shah, according to sources in the BJP.

The schedule for the new party chief’s election — set to be held in the last week of December — was discussed at a meeting of general secretaries, held under Nadda, Wednesday.

Currently, elections are going on for organisational posts.

Speaking to ThePrint, Vinod Sonkar, Lok Sabha MP and member of the team supervising the polls, said the election of mandal presidents is almost over. The election of district presidents and state executive members is on.

Once this process gets over, polls will be held between 1 and 15 December to elect BJP state presidents and nation executive members, said Sonkar.

Apart from him, the four-member team announced in July and led by former Union minister Radha Mohan Singh also has former MP Hansraj Ahir and Karnataka MLA C.T. Ravi.

During the campaign for Haryana assembly elections in October, Shah had refuted the charge of remaining the “super power running the party from behind the scenes”. He had said a new president will take charge in December after the organisational polls.

The second term of Shah, who took over as party president in 2014, ended earlier in January. However, BJP’s national executive deferred organisational elections and extended Shah’s term until the end of Lok Sabha elections held in May.

BJP’s constitution allows for only two three-year terms for party presidents.

The party’s parliamentary board, BJP’s highest decision-making body, appointed Nadda as the working president in June after Shah took charge as Home Minster.


Also read: Ayodhya & Kashmir done, BJP shifts focus to Bengal — ‘citizenship law a necessity in state’


Nadda’s bid for Shah’s chair

In a bid to take over as the party chief, J.P. Nadda has been following Amit Shah’s style of functioning and touring all states under the ‘Pravas’ programme.

This week, Nadda is visiting Uttarakhand to meet MLAs and take part in the state unit’s core committee meeting. He visited Bihar last week, ahead of next year’s assembly elections. This was the first visit of a senior BJP leader to the state after the Patna floods. During the visit, Nadda met Chief Minister Nitish Kumar to send out a message of unity in BJP’s alliance with JD(U).

Nadda had also visited Jharkhand, West Bengal, Himachal Pradesh, Maharashtra and Northeast as part of the tour.

“President Amit Shah has already delegated almost 80 per cent work of his work to Nadda ji. Every regular meeting takes place under his guidance. Only for critical decisions do both consult each other,” said a BJP general secretary who didn’t wish to be named.

Talking about Nadda’s elevation, senior BJP leaders say the party’s less-than-impressive performance in last month’s Maharashtra and Haryana assembly elections won’t hamper Nadda’s prospects.

“In politics, if a surviving chief minister does not perform well and doesn’t get desired results, the onus is on him and not central leadership,” said a senior leader who did not want to be named.

“In Haryana, if we got lesser number of seats, this will be credited in Manohar Lal Khattar’s account. And in Maharashtra, it will be in Devendra Fadnavis’s account. So there will be no question raised on the performance of J.P. Nadda,” added the leader.

Another BJP leader pointed out that Nadda’s work won’t be as big as Shah since the latter has already created a vast organisation and done monumental work in capacity-building, like membership strength and infrastructure development.

During his tenure, Shah spent 400 days travelling across states, staying overnight in different states for over 300 days. He travelled 7,90,000 km in five years — 3,38,000 km for organisational purpose and 4,52,000 km for election campaigns.


Also read: Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress are walking into an Amit Shah trap in Maharashtra


 

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1 COMMENT

  1. Only Amit Shah could be Amit Shah’s successor as party chief! What is JP Nadda, if not Amit Shah’s hologram? He can’t take any decision by himself!

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