This Article is From Jan 19, 2020

JP Nadda Likely To Succeed Amit Shah As BJP President

JP Nadda was appointed the BJP's working president in July last year in an indication that he was the likely choice for the top organisational job.

JP Nadda Likely To Succeed Amit Shah As BJP President

JP Nadda was in-charge of the BJP's election campaign in UP in the run-up to the Lok Sabha polls.

New Delhi:

JP Nadda is likely to be appointed BJP's national president on Monday. Top party leaders including Union ministers are likely to arrive at the BJP headquarters to file nominations in support of Mr Nadda, who has long been seen as Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Amit Shah's choice for the job.

Senior BJP leader Radha Mohan Singh, who is in charge of the party's organisational poll process, said that nominations for the national president's election will be filed on January 20, and a contest will take place the next day if required.

Conventionally, the BJP elects its president with consensus and without any contest.

The election of a new president will bring an end to Amit Shah's tenure of over five-and-a-half years during which the BJP expanded its footprints across the country like never before and enjoyed its best phase in terms of elections, despite  setbacks in state polls.

With Mr Shah joining the PM Modi's government as home minister, the BJP began the exercise for electing his successor as the party has the convention of ''one person, one post''.

Mr Nadda was appointed as the party's working president in July last year in an indication that the Himachal Pradesh leader was the likely choice for the top organisational job.

In the run-up to the 2019 Lok Sabha election, he was in-charge of the BJP's election campaign in Uttar Pradesh, where the party faced a tough challenge from the grand alliance of the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party. The party won 62 out of the 80 Lok Sabha seats in Uttar Pradesh.

Mr Nadda has long been a member of the BJP parliamentary board, its highest decision making body. He had served as a minister in the first Narendra Modi government.

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