NEW DELHI: BJP president JP Nadda reconstituted the party’s highest decision-making body Parliamentary Board and the Central Election Committee (CEC) on Wednesday. While the exclusion of Union transport minister Nitin Gadkari and Madhya Pradesh chief minister (CM) Shivraj Singh Chouhan and non-inclusion of Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath caught most of the attention, the fact that there is neither any CM in the Parliamentary Board nor any Muslim face in the CEC got widely unnoticed.
Narendra Modi as Gujarat CM was in the Parliamentary Board along with Chouhan for a long time before the former became prime minister in 2014. Both of them were considered close to the party’s ideological compass Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). After Modi’s elevation, Chouhan continued to be a member of the board, which has a maximum of 11 members.
In fact, Chouhan was the only CM in the board since 2014 till he was dropped in Wednesday’s rejig. He was not replaced by any other CM, not even Yogi Adityanath.
Why no CM in Parliamentary Board
According to highly-placed sources in the BJP, there were three reasons behind dropping Chouhan. Firstly, the party leadership wanted to signal Chouhan’s reducing clout in the organisation. Secondly, the party is slowly edging out the leaders who were once close to veteran leader L K Advani. Chouhan's proximity to Advani and his prime ministrial ambitions are not lost on the present leadership of the BJP. Thirdly, the party did not wish to keep any CM on the board. This was because it did not want to make Yogi Adityanath a board member.
And, this explains why Yogi Adityanath was not included in the board. The party leadership did not wish to include the powerful UP CM in the board because of his growing stature. The leadership can now justify his non-inclusion on the ground that there is no CM on the board.
Past presidents
Although there is no rule, traditionally former BJP presidents have been a part of the Parliamentary Board. The past presidents who have been members of the board are M Venkaiah Naidu, Gadkari, Rajnath Singh and Amit Shah.
Gadkari was a member of the board between 2010 and 2013 by virtue of being the party president.
When defence minister Rajnath Singh took over the baton of the party’s presidentship in 2013, he retained Naidu and Gadkari on the board. When Shah became the party president in 2014 and again in 2017, he retained all three – Naidu, Gadkari and Singh – on the board.
Naidu resigned from the board as also from the BJP after he was nominated as vice-presidential candidate in 2017.
Nadda retained Gadkari, Singh and Shah on the board after he became the BJP president in 2020.
While Gadkari was dropped from the board on Wednesday, it now has two former presidents – Rajnath Singh and Amit Shah.
Gadkari has become an exception to the unwritten rule.
No Muslim face in CEC
When Rajnath Singh became the BJP president for the first time in 2005, he reconstituted the Central Election Committee which comprises 15 members. He included Syed Shahnawaz Hussain as one of its members.
Hussain was also a senior national spokesperson of the BJP till he was sworn in as the industries minister of Bihar on February 9, 2021.
However, he was dropped as a CEC member in the reconstitution carried out by Nadda on Wednesday.
Hussain now remains only as a Bihar MLC (member of Legislative Council). He lost the post of industries minister when Bihar CM Nitish Kumar parted ways with the BJP on August 9.
With Hussain’s exit, the CEC is bereft of a Muslim face for the first time in the last 17 years.
