In a major reshuffle in the BJP’s Parliamentary Board, the highest decision-making body of the party, former BJP president and Union Minister Nitin Gadkari and Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, the party’s longest serving CM, were dropped, giving way for six new members, including 79-year-old influential “Lingayat” leader and former Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa and former IPS officer and Punjab leader Iqbal Singh Lalpura.
The exit of Gadkari and Chouhan from the Parliamentary Board is suggestive of the continuation of “generational changes” policy in the BJP before the next Lok Sabha polls in 2024 which started from 2014 onwards, but Yediyurappa’s inclusion surely did not fit in this pattern and could be attributed to political exigency (Karnataka polls).
The BJP has created “Margdarshak Mandal” to accommodate party veterans like LK Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi after they ceased to be the members of the board.
Gadkari’s recent reported comments that “sometime I think like quitting politics” and “politics is now only for satta” (power) had created ripples in the political circles giving rise to speculation about his equation with the top BJP leadership. Chouhan, the three-time Chief Minister, would be facing Assembly polls in Madhya Pradesh in 2023.
This is the first time the board has been rejigged under Nadda, who took over as the party president in 2020.
In an exercise to make the apex body regionally and socially more representative, the BJP has included tribal, OBC, minorities members, including former Assam CM and Union Minister Sarbananda Sonowal (tribal), former Lok Sabha member from Haryana Sudha Yadav (OBC) and former Union Minister Satyanarayan Jatiya (SC) from Madhya Pradesh.
Lalpura, a member from the minority community, was appointed the Minorities Commission Chairman in 2021 for the second time. A decorated officer, he was one of the police officers selected to arrest Sikh extremist leader Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and recently played a key role on behalf of the BJP to negotiate with the agitating farmers in Punjab. His appointment in the BJP’s powerful body indicates the party’s attempts to expand its base in the AAP-ruled-Punjab in the run-up to 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
One more key entrant to the influential BJP’s panel is Dr K Laxman, who is a Rajya Sabha member and comes from Hyderabad. Former Telangana BJP president, Laxman is currently party’s OBC Morcha chairman. His inclusion is BJP’s attempt to increase its political footprints in Telangana which is to go to poll before December 2023.
Yediyurappa’s entry to the board is also suggestive of the party’s efforts to bring unity in the faction-ridden Karnataka BJP where the “Lingayat” patriarch holds considerable clout and could become a rallying point for the party. The State is to face Assembly elections next year.
The parliamentary panel in its previous form had five vacancies caused by the passing away of senior leaders — Arun Jaitley, Sushma Swaraj and Ananth Kumar — and election of M Venkaiah Naidu as Vice-President and Thawarchand Gehlot being appointed as Karnataka Governor.
Besides BJP president JP Nadda and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the other members of the 11-member parliamentary board are: Rajnath Singh, Amit Shah, BS Yediyurappa, Sarbananda Sonowal, K Laxaman, Iqbal Singh Lalpura, Sudha Yadav, Satyanarayan Jatiya and BL Santosh (Secretary).
The party also made key changes in its Central Election Committee (CEC) and named Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and Union minister Bhupender Yadav among its new members.
Gadkari and Chouhan ceased to be the BJP’s Central Election Committee (CEC) members after their omission from the board.
All parliamentary board members automatically become part of the CEC, which has some additional members as well.
Former Union Ministers Jual Oram and Shahnawaz Hussain and former BJP Mahila Morcha chief Vijaya Rahatkar have been dropped from the CEC. After these changes, the board now has the full strength of 11 members while the CEC has 15 leaders.
The new entrants to the CEC are Rajasthan leader Om Mathur and BJP women wing chief Vanathi Srinivasan from Tamil Nadu, besides Fadnavis and Union Minister Bhupender Yadav.
According to sources, more changes in the organisation are expected before the Lok Sabha polls and the party would open opportunities to new faces.