The suspense over the appointment of new Chief Minister in Rajasthan following the BJP’s victory in the recent State Assembly election will be over on December 12, when a Legislature Party meeting will be convened here to nominate the leader of the ruling party. The much-awaited exercise follows the selection of Mohan Yadav as the Madhya Pradesh CM on Monday.
The newly elected BJP MLAs were informed about the meeting and instructed to “compulsorily” attend it, party’s State general secretary Bhajan Lal Sharma said here on Monday. The BJP’s central leadership is expected to reveal its choice at the meeting and seek concurrence of the legislators for the Chief Minister-designate’s name.
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Three observers appointed by the party, including Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, will be in attendance at the meeting, which will start after the registration of all MLAs. The two other observers are Rajya Sabha Member Saroj Pandey and BJP national general secretary Vinod Tawde.
The central observers, appointed by BJP president J.P. Nadda, may also hold one-on-one talks with the MLAs in the morning.
Amid the speculations about the new Chief Minister, the MLAs continued to call on the senior BJP leader and former CM Vasundhara Raje at her Civil Lines residence here on Monday. The BJP sources said the MLAs were meeting Ms. Raje to congratulate her for the party’s victory and it should not be seen as lobbying or a show of support.
Ms. Raje, who is among the frontrunners for the CM’s post, recently went to New Delhi and met Mr. Nadda and other BJP leaders. Other leaders in the reckoning are Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, Ashwini Vaishnaw, Kirodi Lal Meena and Mahant Balaknath, though the party’s central leadership may spring a surprise on the lines of its choice for Madhya Pradesh.
In a note of disapproval on legislators gathering at Ms. Raje’s residence, former Leader of the Opposition Rajendra Rathore, who has lost the Taranagar Assembly seat, told presspersons that the people in the State had voted in the name of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. “No one should be under an illusion that the votes came in his or her name. This is not the truth,” he said.
