Union home minister Rajnath Singh is all set to become the in-charge of the BJP campaign in Uttar Pradesh.
Union home minister Rajnath Singh is all set to become the in-charge of the BJP campaign in Uttar Pradesh.
According to highly placed sources, the BJP may stop just short of announcing a chief ministerial candidate and will, instead, appoint three or four leaders to assist Mr Singh.
The leaders who are to be assigned the task are BJP MP Yogi Adityanath, who will take charge of eastern UP; Varun Gandhi, who will oversee central UP; Union minister Uma Bharti, who will take charge of Bundelkhand and parts of western UP. Union minister Sanjeev Baliyan could be added to the team for western UP. Smriti Irani will also be a part of the campaign since the party believes she has developed a base among female voters.
This arrangement, according to sources, will also take care of the caste equations. Mr Singh and Yogi Adityanath will bring in Thakur votes while Mr Gandhi will win over Brahmins and the youth. Ms Bharti will address OBC voters, particularly non-Yadavs, and Mr Baliyan will consolidate Jat votes in favour of the party. “This team will work under Mr Singh in close coordination and help the party in coming to power. The chief ministerial candidate will be decided later,” said a top party functionary.
The BJP high command is aware of the rampant factionalism in the state unit and does not wish to fuel factional wars by announcing chief ministerial candidate before the Assembly elections.
“The selection of a chief ministerial candidate will automatically cause heartburn among other leaders, who will then work half-heartedly in the elections. We want a team effort to bring the party to power and hence this decision,” the party functionary said.
Mr Singh, who accompanied PM Narendra Modi to a rally in Saharanpur in May, will obviously be playing a major role in UP elections. He will be addressing half a dozen rallies long with BJP president Amit Shah in the state in the coming weeks, beginning with Mau on June 11.
Though Mr Singh is said to be averse to returning to state politics, the party wants him to spearhead the campaign in order to woo upper castes and also the MBCs.
Party strategists feel that the presence of Mr Singh in the UP campaign will curb the aspirations of leaders like Yogi Adityanath, whose supporters have been running a campaign for his being named a chief minister candidate.
It may be recalled that as chief minister in 2001, Mr Singh had first mooted reservation within reservation for most backward castes though the idea was later struck down by court.
