Is Madhya Pradesh Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) losing faith in Chief Minister Shivraj Singh ChouhanIJ The political circles in the State are agog with this question ever since the saffron party announced the names of its star campaigners for November 25, Assembly Elections in the State.
The question is especially asked as the list of BJP star campaigners for the State includes the name of BJPs prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi and vice president and former Chief Minister of State Uma Bharti. Modi would be in the State for four days, on November 18, 20, 21 and 22. Going with the recent surveys that claimed that around 53 per cent of the people wanted Modi as prime minister of the country. BJP feels that Modi’s visits in the State would also benefit party in making hat trick in the November 25, polls. The party has also told Bharti to campaign in the State for a week and has asked her to provide her dates for campaigning in the State.
The BJP that was very much confident of forming the Government for the third consecutive term in the leadership of Chouhan about a couple of months ago, as the internal surveys of the party and the intelligence reports suggested likewise. The BJP was having so much of faith in Chouhan at that point of time that it used to ask its arch political rival in the State, the Congress that it has Shivraj Singh Chouhan, what the Congress has in the run for the Assembly Polls. But things changed drastically ever since the Congress named Union Power Minister, Jyotiraditya Scindia as the chairman of its State campaign committee and truce was established among the grand old party’s satraps and they started united campaigning in the State.
Worried with the changing equation in the State and the latest intelligence reports and the ‘Satta Bazaar’ trends indicating ouster of the BJP Government, the party decided to romp in other leaders than Chouhan as it does not want to go out of power from the State and in the process gala of party leaders were asked to campaign for the party including Modi and Bharti in addition to lK Advani, party president Rajnath Singh, leader of opposition in lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj, leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley former party presidents Murlimanohar Joshi, Venkaiyah Naidu and Nitin Gadkari and others.
Besides these senior leaders, faces from glamour world might also canvass in favour of the BJP including Bollywood stars Vinod Khanna and Hema Malini, Suresh Oberoi, Mukesh Khanna and others in addition to the cine stars yester years TV actress and national president of BJP Mahila Morcha Smriti Irani and cricketer Navjot Singh Sidhu might also be roped in. Now, it would be interesting to watch that whether or not Chouhan sticks to his reservations with Modi and Bharti and campaigns with them jointly. Though his tone has also changed and during a television interview he was all praise for Modi and termed him as a leader with amazing personality having capability to change mindsets of electorate.