Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Amit Shah may induct new faces in his team and reassign roles to incumbent office bearers, as the party readies for the Lok Sabha election scheduled next year.
India’s ruling party is without a prabhari (in-charge) in Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand, Assam and Goa – four states where it is in power in a coalition.
Sidharth Nath Singh and Mahendra Singh, the prabhari for Andhra Pradesh and Assam, respectively, moved into their new role as ministers in Uttar Pradesh government in March last year, while Jharkhand in-charge Trivendra Singh Rawat became the chief minister of Uttarakhand. Goa prabhari Parshottam Rupala, too, became Union minister of state for agriculture in September 2017.
“Assignment of these (vacant) roles is long overdue (and) Shah will assign these responsibilities to new leaders, too,” a BJP leader said. The party plans to hold its national executive next month, and the new appointments could be announced around that time.
BJP vice president Vinay Sahasrabuddhe is also expected to be relieved of his role as the party’s in-charge for Madhya Pradesh following his appointment as president of the Indian Council for Cultural Relations. Himachal Pradesh BJP, too, will get a full-time prabhari, as incumbent Mangal Pandey became minister in the Bihar government in July last year. Pandey was retained as assembly elections in the hill state were just a few months away.
Since his re-election as BJP chief in January 2016, Shah did not introduce too many changes in the team that he had formed after taking over from Rajnath Singh in July 2014. But several national office bearers have since moved into a new role, leaving Shah with a team just over 60% of the allowed strength.
Besides a chief, BJP’s national team can have maximum 13 vice-presidents, nine general secretaries and 15 secretaries. At present, Shah runs the BJP with six vice presidents, seven general secretaries and 11 secretaries.
