Delhi BJP president Satish Upadhyay, on Wednesday announced his new core team, more than three months after he took charge. The party has accorded key roles to city councillors over MlAs to keep all options open for the latter in the wake of re-elections in the Capital. The party released its list after holding marathon meetings and consultations between top functionaries of BJP and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).
While committing itself towards a ‘united organisation’, the party has tried its best to accommodate people from all camps in its core team.
A close look at the list suggests that camp followers of Union Ministers; like Arun Jaitley, Sushma Swaraj, former party presidents Vijay Goel, Harsh Vardhan and former Chief Minister Madan lal Khurana have been enrolled in the fresh team. Some of the closest associates of Upadhyay like South Delhi MP Ramesh Bidhuri, councillor Rekha Gupta and councillor Ashish Sood for the post of general secretaries.
Bidhuri has retained the position of general secretary — a post which is said to be important in the party setup as they are expected to perform all major organisational tasks in the event of the party forming a Government in Delhi. Taking a cue from Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the BJP Delhi unit has also formed a Swachchhta Abhiyan committee.
The list of the new team was released late on Tuesday night. Upadhyay has also appointed eight new vice-presidents. These are Tilak Raj Katari, Rajni Abby, Vishakha Sailani, Jai Prakash, Shikha Rai, Abhay Verma, Kiran Chaddha and Kuljeet Chahal. Besides, eight new secretaries have also been appointed.
Kamaljeet Sherawat has been named the new women’s wing president, whereas, Nakul Bhardwaj has been appointed as the youth wing president. Aman Sinha, Poonam Jha Azad, Harish Khurana, Rajeev Barbara and Dipika Sharma have been appointed as spokesperson while Praveen Shankar Kapoor is the new media convenor in Upadhyay’s team.
Interestingly, Upadhyay, in the party website was also seen saying, “My priority is to strengthen the party and carry forward the mandate given to BJP by the people of this country. My other priority is to keep the organisation united and take every one along.”In the list, the State unit president also gave key roles to councillors ensuring effective ground level work in the area.