BJP begins revamp in States going to polls

The BJP got down to the task of making big organisational changes in the local units of States going to polls in 2018 like Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh and later in 2019, Andhra Pradesh, with unit chiefs being removed and new ones being appointed.

BJP MP from Jabalpur, Rakesh Singh, was appointed chief of the Madhya Pradesh unit on Wednesday, with outgoing chief Nandkumar Chauhan who had been heading the unit since 2014, being accommodated in the national executive of the party. In Rajasthan too the State unit chief Ashok Parnami put in his papers, and was also given a berth in the national executive.

Front runner

Union Minister of State for Agriculture Gajendra Singh Shekhawat is the front runner for the position of Rajasthan BJP president. In Andhra Pradesh, K. Hari Babu resigned as State president on Tuesday and was appointed to the national executive of the party on Wednesday. Among the names doing the rounds as his replacement is that of Kanna Laxminarayana who joined the BJP in 2014 from the Congress.

In both Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, the BJP suffered bypoll defeats, rather ignominiously in the case of the former.

In Andhra Pradesh, the BJP is in an unenviable position of having lost its alliance partner, the ruling Telugu Desam Party. and squeezed politically by agitations on Special Category Status to Andhra Pradesh by not just the TDP but also the opposition, YSR Congress Party.