RAIPUR: Reduced to 15 in the 90-member Chhattisgarh Assembly after its numbing defeat in the state elections, the BJP is yet to pick up the pieces from the poll drubbing and plot a quick turnaround in time for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. While the introspection over the loss is yet to begin in earnest in the state party ranks, the race for the leader of opposition seems to have picked up steam within the BJP.
Word is that there are several contenders for the post. While former chief minister Raman Singh is seen as an obvious choice for the post, there’s speculation that he could be assigned a central role after the LS polls. The party is believed to be deliberating on the likes senior partymen Brijmohan Agrawal, Dharamlal Kaushik, Nankiram Kanwar and Shivratan Sharma as possible contenders for the post.
Party leaders said the name will be finalised before January 4, when the new Assembly session begins. The party’s central observers will take a call on the eventual candidate after holding talks with its elected legislators, a senior BJP leader said.
The party is yet to convene a meeting of its MLAs since the poll defeat. BJP general secretary Anil Jain, who was earlier in-charge for the state polls, has been assigned the same job for the Lok Sabha elections. Party sources told this newspaper that he will be visiting Raipur soon to lay the groundwork for the BJP to reap electoral dividends in the LS polls.