The Bharatiya Janata Party has planned a grand reception in honour of Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the party’s national headquarters following the successful culmination of the G20 Summit in Delhi. The welcome ceremony is likely to see the participation of a large number of BJP leaders and party workers.
The grand welcome comes on expected lines as the BJP sets out an elaborate plan to use India’s successful G20 presidency as a plank reinforcing PM Modi’s image as a “Vishwa Guru” in the run-up to the general elections. Party leaders maintain that the success of the G20 Summit in Delhi, which they credit to the leadership of the Prime Minister, will be a crucial part of their outreach to the electorate not just for the Lok Sabha polls, but also for elections to state assemblies later this year.
The development comes as the BJP seeks to use the G20 momentum to continue as it enters polls in five states. The ceremony will precede a meeting of the BJP’s Central Election Committee to deliberate on the names of its candidates for the Assembly polls, which are due in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Telangana and Mizoram in November-December this year.
The CEC’s members include Prime Minister Narendra Modi, BJP president JP Nadda, Union ministers Amit Shah and Rajnath Singh. The CEC is likely to finalise the names of the party’s candidates for the MP, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan elections.
Also Read: Big move in offing by Modi govt? Speculations rife over agenda of special session of Parliament
Assembly Elections 2023: BJP candidate list likely to be decided
In a break from tradition, the BJP had on August 17 had announced its candidates for 39 seats in MP and 21 in Chhattisgarh. The announcement, three months ahead of the Assembly elections, were for the seats where the party had lost in the last elections. The BJP rarely announces its candidates before the polls are announced by the ELection Commission and the development was seen as an attempt to prevent infighting and frictions closer to the polls.
The BJP had lost the polls in four out of the five states that are scheduled to go to polls later this year, with Mizoram being the sole exception where the MNF formed a government with the BJP as a junior alliance partner. The BJP lost Rajasthan, MP, Chhattisgarh and Telangana elections in 2018 but returned to power in MP a year later following the defection of a large number of Congress MLAs loyal to Jyotiraditya Scindia.
Despite the loss in three key Hindi heartland states, the BJP swept to power in the Lok Sabha elections three months down the line. The Opposition, which has joined hands to take on the BJP in the elections next year, will be keen to prevent a 2019 repeat in 20-24. Buoyed by its massive win in Karnataka, the Congress is hopeful that a good performance in poll-bound states will help limit the BJP’s tally in the Lok Sabha elections this time around. The BJP is the incumbent in MP, while Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh are ruled by the Congress, and Telangana by the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS).