The newly-constituted 40-member team formed by the recently appointed State BJP head Ajay Bhatt on Wednesday meant to steer the saffron party during the electioneering for the upcoming Assembly election barely a year away, has sprung a major surprise.
The surprise lies in the fact that the known loyalists of the three State party satraps- all former Chief Ministers Bhagat Singh Koshyari, Maj Gen Bhuwan Chandra Khanduri and Dr Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank - who have been representing three Parliamentary constituencies - Udham Singh Nagar, Garhwal and Haridwar- have been left in the cold. Three hardcore RSS leaders - Ramlal, Shivprakash and Sanjay Kumar - have been included in the committee, on the other hand, giving the organisation known as the ideological mentor of the saffron party enough of elbow room to manoeuvre things from the front, instead of from behind the scene.
Political insiders say the move is surprising, given the clout the redoubtable trio has been enjoying in the State party roost. “There is no doubt that the party top brass based in Delhi have finalised the names to be included in the committee.
Through it, they have made it crystal clear that the writ of the trio would no longer run in the present party dispensation. The party rank and file are confounded too by the move, wondering over what is kept in store for the three leaders to whom they have had their loyalty fixed for long. Now, it is to be seen how the long- sulking trio being kept out of the Union Government would take things in the coming days,” said one of them.
Eight leaders - Kedar Joshi, Jyoti Prasad Gairola, Kusum Kandwal, Mayank Gupta, Pushkar Dhami, Raju Bhandari, Rajkumari Giri and Vinay Ruhela- have been appointed as vice- presidents. None of them is supposed to be close to the three camps run by the trio.
Sanjay Kumar has been appointed the organising general secretary while three general secretaries are Naresh Bansal, Khajan Das and Gajraj Singh Bisht. Aashish Gupta has been appointed the treasurer while eight - Mahendra Bhatt, Swaraj Vidwan, Vinod Kandari, Sunil Unyal Gama, Kuldeep Kumar, Seema Chauhan, Geeta Thakur and Rajendra Anthwal- have been made secretaries. Pushkar Singh Kala has been appointed as the office secretary while Gyan Singh Negi has been made the chairman of disciplinary committee and Prakash Harbola, the secretary of the same.
Four – former MlA Munna Singh Chauhan, Anil Kapoor Dabbu, Vinay Goel and Verendra Bisht have been appointed as spokespersons of the state BJP. Interestingly, the controversial DAV College principal Devendra Bhashin has been appointed as media in-charge.
Four others- PK Aggrawal, Deepak Dimri, Omprakash Jamdagni and Sardar Baljeet Singh Sony have been made assistant media in-charge of the State party. Besides, Kundan Singh has been made president of the party’s youth affiliate while former City BJP president Neelan Sehgal has been made president of the women wing.
Magan lal Shah has been made president of Scheduled Caste wing while Ram kishan Rawat would head the Scheduled Tribe wing. While Shyamveer Saini would head the OBC wing, Khilendra Choudhary would lead the farmers’ wing. Mazhar Naeem Nawab would head the State party’s minority wing.
Observers feel it is a good move, well-timed a year ahead of the crucial Assembly election 2017 and pre-meditated. “Except for a few, most of the newly appointed party office bearers are young bloods. However, things have been balanced between the old war horses and the young horns as a few elderly leaders have been included too. However, the message is loud and clear that the state party is in the throes of long awaited generational shift. How things would fare electorally is another question, but setting the party in the State free from the long-drawn thralldom of the trio and filling the ranks with the bubbling young blood is a long overdue move,” said one of the observers.