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JP Nadda rejigs BJP’s national team to boost party presence
Joint general secretary (organisation) Saudan Singh was appointed as a vice president in the national team and will oversee the party’s work in Haryana, Punjab and Himachal Pravesh,the party said on Thursday.
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president JP Nadda has put in place organisational changes by reassigning the responsibilities of some functionaries loaned to the party by its ideological parent, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).
According to people aware of the matter, more inductions—including of RSS functionaries —into the BJP’s national team are expected in the coming weeks. According to a party leader who requested anonymity, these changes are in line with the process of building a new team and strengthening the party’s presence across states.
Joint general secretary (organisation) Saudan Singh was appointed as a vice president in the national team and will oversee the party’s work in Haryana, Punjab and Himachal Pravesh,the party said on Thursday.
Singh will take over the party’s work in Punjab and Haryana at a time when the ongoing farmers agitation is at its peak in the two states.
Farmers’ unions in Punjab and Haryana are demanding the repeal of a set of contentious laws enacted in September to open up agricultural markets, which say would weaken the bargaining power of cultivators and put them at the mercy of powerful agribusinesses.
V Satish, also a joint general secretary (organisation), has been given a new title; he will now be a Sanghathak (organiser). Satish, who was earlier in charge of states such as Madhay Pradesh, has been given charge of parliamentary office coordination, scheduled caste/scheduled tribe morcha coordination and Vishesh Sampark, or special outreach.
Shiv Prakash, a third joint general secretary (organisation), has been given charge of Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. He retains the responsibility of looking after the party’s affairs in election-bound West Bengal, where the party is preparing for a tough contest against the ruling Trinamool Congress.
“More names will be added to the national team as there are vacancies in several states including Uttar Pradesh that goes to polls in 2022; in Odisha, Rajasthan and Uttarakhand,” said a functionary aware of the details.
In September, Nadda announced a new national team that had 12 vice presidents, eight general secretaries, three national joint secretaries and 13 secretaries apart from 23 spokespersons.
