NEW DELHI: The BJP has handed over the reins of the party’s Gujarat affairs to its Lok Sabha MP C R Patil, who has looked after Varanasi, the parliamentary constituency of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.Patil succeeds Jitendrabhai Vaghani, who completed four years in the post. He will get a full two years to prepare for the next assembly elections in 2022.
The BJP on Monday also announced the appointment of Tsering Tamgyal as the chief of the party unit in the Union Territory of Ladakh.Patil, 62, is widely known to be an effective office manager, connecting with the electorate with ease, besides pushing the developmental works. In Varanasi, as a trusted lieutenant of Modi, he has nursed the constituency, allowing the people there access to the PM’s local office. Patil is a third-term MP representing Navsari constituency in Gujarat, which he had won with a record margin of 6.89 lakh votes in 2019. His immediate challenge in the state will be to rally the party workers in the bypolls for eight Assembly seats. He is close to both PM Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah.
He has been quite active in the Lok Sabha, taking part in debates and asking questions regularly. The BJP has, of late, been looking into the records of the MPs in Parliament before giving them organisational responsibilities.