With Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his council of Ministers having assumed office, the BJP will now focus on restructuring the organisation and filling the positions in the party that are now vacant.
Starting with the top slot of president, the BJP will soon begin the process of appointing new general secretaries, new spokespersons and fill other vacancies; also on the cards is a rejig of positions and performers will be rewarded with a leg up in the party’s hierarchy.
With party president Rajnath Singh having assumed office as Union Home Minister, the party’s Parliamentary Board will meet to take a decision on who will be his successor. There is speculation that the party high command has already zeroed in on J.P. Nadda for the position. General secretary of the party Amit Shah’s name was also in the reckoning.
“The Parliamentary Board takes the decision on the appointment and so far, the date for the meeting of the Board has not been fixed,” said a party functionary.
Once the president is appointed, the party will move on to the next set of appointments, at least three general secretaries to replace Ananth Kumar, Dharmendra Pradhan and Thawar Chand Gehlot, all of whom have been given a ministerial berth. While Mr. Kumar is the Minister for Chemicals and Fertilizers, Mr. Pradhan is the new Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas (independent charge) and Mr. Gehlot is the Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment.
The party will also have to strengthen its team of spokespersons, with Nirmala Sitharaman being sworn in as Ministers of State for Commerce and Industry besides Finance and Corporate Affairs, Prakash Javadekar taking over as Information and Broadcasting (independent charge), Environment, Forest and Climate Change (independent charge). The party’s other spokesperson Meenakshi Lekhi has also won the MP election from New Delhi constituency.
There will also be a replacement for Ravi Shankar Prasad, the new Union Minister for Communications and Information Technology, Law and Justice; he was recently appointed the chief media coordinator.
