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NEW DELHI: In a first, BJP on Sunday appointed national office-bearers and Union ministers to oversee local body polls in different states, in what is seen as the party’s bid to outsmart rivals and take control of local bodies to expand its base at the grassroots level.
General secretary Bhupender Yadav was appointed election in-charge for the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation polls. In a statement, the party said its president J P Nadda had also appointed Union minister Anurag Thakur as the election in-charge for the upcoming local polls in the Union Territory of Jammu & Kashmir.
K Sudhakar, a minister in Karnataka; Ashish Shelar, BJP’s chief whip in Maharashtra assembly; Gujarat BJP leader Pradip Singh Vaghela and Karnataka BJP MLA Sathish Reddy will be coincharges with Yadav for the GHMC polls, the statement said. Party spokesperson Shahnawaz Hussain and its MP from Madhya Pradesh Sanjay Bhatia will be co-incharges for the J&K polls.
With the BJP making big gains in Telangana, first seen in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls and then emphasised by its surprise win over the TRS in a recent assembly bypoll, the party is looking at the GHMC polls to make a political statement in the state.
It is likely to aggressively target the ruling TRS and its ally AIMIM, which has strong support in Muslim areas of the state capital, to emerge as a force in the GMCH.
The appointment of a national general secretary to mind the city polls underscores the importance the saffron party has attached to the polls. Yadav, who played a crucial role in BJP’s victory in Bihar, has been retained as general secretary in-charge for Gujarat and Bihar.
