In a politically significant development for Uttarakhand where the Assembly election is barely a few months away, one of the nine rebel Congress MlAs who left the party and switched to the BJP, Subodh Uniyal, former MlA from Narendranagar, was inducted in the BJP national council on Saturday. Along with Uniyal who is close to the former Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna, another BJP leader, Prakash Pant, a former State Cabinet Minister, has also been included in the saffron party’s national council. The decision to include the duo was taken in course of the BJP national council meeting at Kozhikode district of Kerala.
Mention worthy, the nine Congress MlAs led by Bahuguna raised the banner of revolt against the ‘dictatorial’ functioning of the Chief Minister Harish Rawat on March 18 when the State Government was about to pass the appropriation Bill in the Assembly. later, they were disqualified as MlAs by the Speaker, a matter that is still pending before the Supreme Court.
Observers say that the development would enthuse the newly-inducted leaders. “The message sent forth by the saffron party’s top brass is loud and clear. It makes it a point by the inclusion of one of the rebels into the policy-making forum of the party that the party high command is keen to use the former Congress rebels up to the hilt to wreck the Congress ahead of the election. This is deemed to be a stern message sent to the veteran party leaders who are engaged in factional bickering, showing them that the top brass would not indulge them much,” the observer says.
Given the present state of things, it is likely that all the Congress rebels who switched sides later would be given the party tickets in the constituencies they were elected from in the previous election during the upcoming election.
However, the state BJP leadership is reluctant to lend much importance to the development. They termed it as routine, saying that one member is selected from each Parliamentary constituency. “Uniyal has been nominated from Tehri lok Sabha constituency while former state cabinet minister Prakash Pant has been nominated from Almora constituency. There is nothing to read much into it politically,” said a senior state BJP leader. A party insider said that the newly inducted leaders would be fielded from the seats won by the Congress during 2012 election. “These seats being deemed to be Congress citadels, the question of old time BJP leaders resenting such nominations does not arise,” he said.