First-time legislator Manohar Lal Khattar, 61, is set to become the 21st Chief Minister of Haryana.
Mr. Khattar, a Punjabi, pipped other aspirants to the post owing to his RSS background and proximity to top BJP leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party president Amit Shah.
He was unanimously elected leader of the BJP’s 47-member legislature group on Tuesday, following which he and senior BJP leaders met Governor Kaptan Singh Solanki and apprised him of the decision.
The swearing-in will be held at the Tau Devi Lal stadium in Panchkula on October 26. Mr. Khattar won the Karnal seat with a margin of 63,773 votes.
State party chief and Mahendragarh legislator Ram Bilas Sharma proposed Mr. Khattar’s name in the legislature party meeting and several others, including Capt. Abhimanyu and Om Prakash Dhankar, backed his candidature. BJP observers M. Venkaiah Naidu and Dinesh Sharma were present. Mr. Khattar has been a member of the BJP’s national executive and senior RSS pracharak. He was responsible for screening party candidates.
Mr. Khattar from Rohtak entered the Karnal electoral battlefield as an outsider and met with resistance not just from local cadres but also the BJP’s Lok Sabha MP from Karnal, Ashwini Kumar Minna.