BHOPAL: Madhya Pradesh BJP will send a panel of 4-5 potential candidates to it’s national leadership, for deciding the party’s candidate for the November 12 by-election to one Rajya Sabha seat from the state.
The decision was taken at the meeting of the state BJP’s Core Committee, held at the residence of CM Dr Mohan Yadav on Monday.
Detailing about the meeting, state BJP chief Hemant Khandelwal said, “The selection of the candidate for the one vacant Rajya Sabha seat was discussed during the Core Committee meeting. Four to five names were considered, including potential candidates from Madhya Pradesh and other states. It was unanimously decided to prepare a panel of four to five candidates for the Rajya Sabha seat and forward it to the central leadership for consideration.”
While the state party chief didn’t disclose the names of the potential candidates, informed sources within the party in Bhopal, confided that the possible names may include ex-MP ministers, Lal Singh Arya, Arvind Singh Bhadoriya and Ranjana Baghel, ex-Rajya Sabha member Sumer Singh Solanki and Amar Singh who is a former legislator from Singrauli district. These names will be considered by the national leadership, if it doesn’t want to send any leader from outside MP to the upper house of the Parliament.
Some more names, who are from outside MP, are also doing rounds of BJP circles, including union minister Hardeep Singh Puri (whose RS term will end on November 25), former Tamil Nadu MLA and ex-national president of BJP Mahila Morcha, Vanathi Srinivasan and a former bureaucrat from Punjab.
The November 12 by-election to the Rajya Sabha for one seat, has been necessitated after the resignation of former union minister L Murugan. The last date for filing nomination is November 2.
The state BJP’s Core Committee meeting was attended by Chief Minister Mohan Yadav, former chief minister and Union Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, the party’s national in-charge for Madhya Pradesh, Biplab Kumar Deb, and state general secretary (organisation) Chandrashekhar.
The meeting decided to organise large rallies in Indore, Jabalpur and Bhopal as part of the party’s “Save Democracy, Remove Anarchy” campaign, targeting around one lakh participants at each rally. Similar programmes will be held at all district headquarters across Madhya Pradesh to spread the campaign’s message.
The meeting also discussed ways to improve coordination to ensure that Madhya Pradesh benefits fully from Central government schemes. Under the Chief Minister’s direction, a special team led by ministers from various state government departments will be formed to help ensure that the schemes reach more people.
The meeting also decided to assign one Member of Parliament to each Union government ministry. The arrangement is intended to improve coordination among state ministers, MPs and officials, speed up the implementation of schemes and help Madhya Pradesh secure maximum benefits from them.
