The speculation over the political future of former IAS officer Arvind Kumar Sharma ended on Saturday when Uttar Pradesh BJP president Swatantra Dev Singh appointed him as party’s UP unit vice-president.
Sharma, an MLC, is considered close to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and had left the civil service to join politics. He joined the BJP in January this year and was elected as MLC the next day. Since then speculation was rife that he would be accommodated in the Yogi Cabinet and be given an important post.
A Gujarat cadre officer hailing from Uttar Pradesh, Sharma had long been one of the trusted bureaucrats of Modi since his tenure as Gujarat Chief Minister. He also served in key positions in the PMO after Modi became Prime Minister in 2014.
There was speculation that Sharma might replace one of the two Deputy Chief Ministers assisting Yogi Adityanath in the Government. At present Dr Dinesh Sharma and Keshav Prasad Maurya are two Deputy Chief Ministers in the Government.
“With Sharma being made vice-president his immediate elevation to Cabinet is ruled out as BJP’s constitution calls for one man one post. But it does not mean he can never be made minister. Then, he will have to resign from the party post,” said Sanjay Dixit, BJP leader.
In fact, as per the party statute vice-president is just an ornamental post where senior leaders are accommodated. At present Pankaj Singh, son of Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Vijay Bahadur Pathak are vice-presidents of the party.
The executive power in the party wrests with the secretary.
A highly placed source in the BJP told this reporter that on Thursday evening BJP State president Swatantra Dev Singh and state Secretary (Organisation) Sunil Bansal were summoned to Delhi and they returned on Friday morning.
“Organisational issues were discussed and the appointment of Sharma could be linked to that meeting,” the source said.
The party also appointed Archana Mishra (Lucknow) and Amit Balmiki (Bulandshahr) as State secretaries. The party also announced State presidents of various frontal organistions of the party.
Pranshudutt Dwivedi (Farrukhabad) has been made president of Yuva Morcha, Geeta Shakya , a Rajya Sabha MP (Auraiya) has been made Mahila Morcha president , Kameshwar Singh (Gorakhpur) will be the new Kisan Morcha president , Narendra Kashyap, former MP (Ghaziabad) has been made Backward Morcha president and Kaushal Kishore ,MP from Lucknow has been made Scheduled Caste Morcha president .
Sanjay Gond (Gorakhpur) has been made Scheduled Tribe Morcha president and Kunwar Basit Ali (Meerut) has been nominated president of the State Minority Morcha.