JP Nadda, Thakur favourites as BJP looks for CM in HP
SHIM LA: Union minister JPN add a and five-time legislator Jairam Th a ku rh ave emerged as front runners to be the next chief minister of Himachal Pradesh after Monday’ s shock defeat of B ha ratiya Janata Party’ s projected CM candidate Pr em Kumar D hum al.
The BJP wrested power from the Congress, winning 44 seats in the 68- member assembly. But the party was scrambling on Tuesday to pick a new CM as the 73- year-old Dhumal lost to Rajinder Singh Rana, a former protégé who had joined the Congress.
Though party sources say D hum ali snot out of the running, his defeat has thrown open the leadership race and brought the spotlight on Union health minister Nadda, a Rajya Sabha member with roots in the hill state.
N add a’ s proximity to the party leadership is viewed as a plus point for him, though several leaders believe that the BJP top brass will choose the CM from among its newly elected MLAs.
Th a ku rand several senior B JP lawmakers in the state are also in the reckoning. A former rural development and pan ch a ya ti raj minister in the state, 52-year-old Thakur and is known to be close to the RSS and to BJP president Am it Shah .“Whatever the party decides, I will do. I am happy that there is going to be a BJP government in Him ac hal Pradesh ,” Thakur said on Tuesday.
Sources said his case becomes strong because the party may opt for a Thakur leader, the state’s dominant community. N adda is a Br ah min. The B JP has also been known to choose not-so-obvious candidates as chief minister in some other states. If that trend holds true, RSS pracharak Ajay Jamwal could emerge as the party’s choice.
The newly elected B JP legislators and central leaders are expected to meet in Shimla to elect their leader, who would be sworn in as the chief minister. One of them, D hum al loyalist Vi render Kunwar has offered to vacate his seat for the former chief minister if he is nominated as the chief minister.
The BJP leadership has appointed defence minister Nirm ala Sit ha ram an and Union minister Na render Sing hT omar to oversee the selection process.
“It a great victory for party, and central leaders will hold consultations before the party legislators meet to elect a new leader ,” state party chief Satpal Singh Satti, who lost as well.
The other names doing the rounds include Mo hinder Singh, who won for a seventh time, fiveterm legislator Rajiv Bind al, and former state BJP chief Suresh B ha radwaj and Kr is hanKa poor, both elected to fourth terms.
DHUMAL IS NOT OUT OF THE RUNNING, BUT HIS DEFEAT HAS THROWN OPEN THE LEADERSHIP RACE AND BROUGHT THE SPOTLIGHT ON NADDA
DHARAMSHALA: This assembly election has sprung many surprises. While the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won even as its general fell, many of the Congress bigwigs too had to bite the bullet.
The biggest shocker was the Sujanpur assembly segment result wherein BJP chief ministerial face Prem Kumar Dhumal’s one-time protégé Rajinder Rana (51) turned the tables on his mentor.
The question as what made the realtor-turned-politician Rana take on the might of the tallest BJP leader and why people preferred him over a probable chief minister has left many scurrying for a possible explanation.
Lekh Raj Rana, a close confidant and poll manager of Rajinder Rana, said Rana has worked tirelessly for the people of Sujanpur for more than 15 years.
His philanthropic works — sponsoring marriages of girls fromlowersocio-economic background, scholarships worth lakhs of rupees to meritorious poor students and countless medical camps — has earned him a reputation of a goodSamaritan.
“This was a battle between a big name and a ground-level worker and the people of Sujanpur chose the latter," Rana himself said after he emerged winner on Monday.
HIS SUPPORTERS SAY HE WORKED TIRELESSLY FOR THE PEOPLE OF SUJANPUR FOR MORE THAN 15 YEARS
“Rana likes to remain among his people. The most important thing in politics is connect with the public and Rana has maintained that connect for 15 years,” Lekh Raj said.
And the most important thing, he said, is that since Rana hascomefromtheBJP,heknows the party’s strategies besides its leaders’ strengths and weaknesses.
“That is why he was able to counter the BJP’s high-tech campaign,” said Lekh Raj, himself a one-time saffron party worker.
Besides, he never let his differenceswithmentorDhumalgrew into bitterness and remained humble throughout the election and never campaigned negatively, he added.
It was Dhumal who brought Rana into politics around a decade ago and was appointed the chairman of the media advisory board after Dhumal formed government in 2007 but had to quit after his name cropped up in a sex scandal in 2009.
Rana fell out with his mentor and contested the 2012 assembly election as an independent from the Sujanpur segment, registering a victory by a margin of over 14,000 votes.
He went on join the Congress and resigned from the state assembly to contest the Lok Sabha election as a Congress nominee against Dhumal’s son Anurag Thakur while his wife contested the by-election from Sujanpur.
The move failed but Rana got the post of vice-chairman of the state pollution control board in the Virbhadra Singh government.