Internal differences between senior leaders have forced the leadership of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to refrain from announcing the name of the president of the district unit of Haridwar.
On the insistence of party president Amit Shah, the State unit has restructured its organisational setup in the State.
The party abolished 23 organisational districts on Sunday and scaled them down to 14 in the new setup. The party announced names of 13 units, however, it abstained from announcing the name of the district party President of Haridwar.
The names of all the heads of the party’s organisational districts were finalised after a brain storming session involving senior party leaders and the national Joint secretary (Organisation) of party, Saudan Singh. It is learnt that consensus eluded over the name of the president of Haridwar unit.
The district unit of Haridwar is deeply ridden with factionalism.
The local leaders are divided into the camps of Member of Parliament (MP) from Haridwar, Ramesh Pokhariyal ‘Nishank’, Cabinet Minister Satpal Maharaj and Mayor Manoj Garg (protégé of Cabinet Minister Madan Kaushik) .
In August senior party leaders had to intervene when the supporters of Satpal Maharaj and Madan Kaushik exchanged blows. Garg along with his supporters had gone to the Premnagar ashram owned by the Satpal’s trust to demolish an alleged encroachment. To the chagrin of the State Government and party both sides filed police complaints against each other. Similarly the supporters of the MP Nishank and Khanpur MlA Pranav Singh ‘Champion’ clashed during a party function. The political observers are of the view that BJP leadership would face problems in deciding over the name of the President of district unit of Haridwar considering the deep rooted factionalism there.
When contacted the State Party President Ajay Bhatt said that the party wants to take everybody in confidence before announcing the name of the President of Haridwar unit. He said that at present Haridwar MP Nishank and Cabinet minister Madan Kaushik are busy in Gujarat so the party decided to hold the announcement for Haridwar till they return.
In the organisational restructuring on Sunday the party formed 14 new district units. Under the new set up every district would have one unit each however in Dehradun the party formed two organisational districts (Dehradun and Mahanagar).