C.R. Patil, a three-time parliamentarian, was on Monday appointed as president of the Gujarat BJP in place of Jitu Vaghani, who completed his tenure. Mr. Patil is the Lok Sabha MP from Navsari in South Gujarat.
Mr. Patil’s appointment assumes significance since he is Marathi settled in Gujarat and has replaced Mr. Vaghani, a Patidar leader from Saurashtra. In fact, he is the first non-Gujrati leader to be appointed as the party chief in the Prime Minister and Home Minister’s home State.
Considered close to PM Modi, Mr. Patil is in charge of the PM’s Lok Sabha constituency Varanasi.
Larger game plan
“His appointment suggests larger game plan in Gujarat since a Jain is a CM [Vijay Rupani] while a Marathi has been made the party chief,” a former BJP MP said.
He said there may be other changes in the next few weeks.
“What is more interesting is that a leader considered close to PM Modi has replaced Vaghani, a protege of Home Minister Amit Shah,” said a BJP leader.
Also his appointment has come just ahead of the crucial by-elections for eight Assembly seats necessitated by the defections of Congress MLAs during the recently held Rajya Sabha polls.
Preparations for byelections
Though the schedule for the byelections is yet to be announced, the ruling party has already started preparations for the same.
Secondly, Gujarat is also going for a major round of municipal and district panchayat elections in November and December when six main municipal corporations in Ahmedabad, Surat, Rajkot, Vadodara, Jamnagar and Bhavnagar will go for polls first and subsequently 33 district panchayats.
