Uttarakhand: BJP legislature party meeting on Monday to announce name of next CM

Vibha Sharma

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, March 20

The name of the next Chief Minister of Uttarakhand will be announced on Monday following a meeting of newly-elected MLAs in the state capital to elect the leader of the legislature party in presence of central observers Rajnath Singh and Meenakshi Lekhi.

Though the state leadership continues to play close to the chest on what transpired at the meeting called by Home Minister Amit Shah regarding the CM and government formation today, reports from Dehrtadun suggested a “grand” oath-taking ceremony on March 23.

BJP president JP Nadda and senior leaders from the state, including caretaker CM Pushkar Singh Dhami, Trivendra Singh, Ramesh Pokhariyal Nishank, Madan Kaushik and Satpal Maharaj, were present in the meeting called by the Home Minister to finalise the name of the next CM.

Later, senior central leaders, including General Secretary (organisation) BL Santhosh, also briefed Prime Minister Narendra Modi regarding the government formation in the four states the BJP won in the recently-concluded Assembly elections.

While the rest is all settled, suspense continues to prevail around the name of the next CM of Uttarakhand, where the saffron party romped back to power by winning 47 seats out of 70 but incumbent CM Pushkar Singh Dhami lost his Khatima seat.

Though Dhami continues to be the frontrunner despite the defeat, since March 10 (when the results were announced) the names of several state leaders, including Chaubattakhal MLA Satpal Maharaj, Srinagar MLA Dhan Singh Rawat and Rajya Sabha member Anil Baluni, have doing the rounds amid reports of several MLAs also “offering their seat in favour of Dhami”.

Amid criticism by opposition over the “lack of consensus in the BJP on the name”, the buzz is that the new CM is “likely to be one of the elected MLAs”.

Among the reasons that Dhami continues to be among top-runners is the fact that the BJP contested under his name and won. Besides, the party has already drawn much flak for changing two chief ministers in quick succession during the last tenure. “Everyone knows why Dhami lost,” some also say, adding that the PM had also announced his name.

If the BJP does go in for a new face, caste and regional balance will be a deciding factor, they add.

Interestingly the BJP faced an almost similar situation in the 2017 state elections in Himachal Pradesh when it announced former CM Prem Kumar Dhumal as its CM face.

While the party won Himachal, Dhumal lost his Sujanpur seat to Congress’ Rajinder Rana, following which Jai Ram Thakur was selected for the top post.

Amid speculations that the BJP may choose to “respect people’s mandate” in Uttarakhand as well, observers point to a big “difference in the situation in the two hill states”.

“Dhami chose to contest from Khatima despite being warned about internal forces working against him there, whereas Dhumal was shifted to Sujanpur by the central leadership itself. Besides, Dhumal was not an incumbent CM and Himachal verdict was largely seen as one for the PM ”.

PM Modi, Amit Shah, Nadda and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh are expected to attend the oath-taking ceremony of Yogi Adityanath as Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh which is likely to be held on March 25.