Mumbai: Ending speculation about the new state and Mumbai president of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the party has reappointed Chandrakant Patil as the president of its Maharashtra unit, while Mangal Prabhat Lodha will continue to be the party's Mumbai unit president.
Though the party claims to have internal democracy, both were not elected by their state level representatives, but were appointed by the party high command.
The BJP state executive is scheduled to meet on Sunday, February 16, at Navi Mumbai, where the election of the new presidents were expected to take place. But a sudden announcement by BJP President JP Nadda surprised everyone.
Pankaja Munde and Sudhir Mungantiwar were front runners for this post. But Patil, who is close to Home Minister Amit Shah, managed to get one more term. It was also being said that Lodha may be replaced by Ashih Shelar or Atul Bhatkhalkar. But Lodha too got an extension for one more term.
Keeping in mind the BMC election in 2022, BJP decided to keep Lodha, as Gujarati and Marwari voters play a key role in Mumbai.
Patil who belongs to the Maratha community has led the party during assembly election too. By keeping him, the BJP leadership has tried to ensure regional balance. This was also a signal to Munde that the party leadership is still unhappy about her.
Two-day session
BJP has organised two days session of its 10,000 state level representatives. The session will be inaugurated by the party's national president Nadda on Sunday. The meeting will be attended by all the elected legislators and members of parliament.
"Two resolutions will be passed in this session. One will expose the MVA government's failure and condemn Shiv Sena, Congress and NCP for insulting the mandate.
Second will congratulate the Narendra Modi government for setting a trust for the construction of Ram Mandir and passing the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA)," former minister Vinod Tawade said.
