With Nadda in Modi cabinet, will Smriti Irani be new BJP president?
There is speculation that the BJP may pick Smriti Irani, who was defeated in Amethi in the Lok Sabha battle; she is known to be aggressive and multi-lingual
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is poised to have its first woman party president, it seems.
With incumbent president JP Nadda joining the BJP-led NDA government, the party needs a full-time head – a coveted post held in the past by LK Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi, Nitin Gadkari and Amit Shah.
There is intense speculation that Smriti Irani, who lost the Amethi seat in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, will be made the BJP president.
BJP leaders like Dharmendra Pradhan or Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who were likely contenders for the president's post are now in the Narendra Modi cabinet and so are ruled out.
Both Pradhan and Chouhan enjoyed the right qualifications to lead the party after its bruising show in the just-held Lok Sabha elections when it failed to get a majority on its own in the Lok Sabha.
Others in the race
According to media reports, the most talked about name in political circles is of BJP general secretary Vinod Tawde, a former minister in the Maharashtra government who has become one of the most influential general secretaries.
The others said to be in the race are K Laxman, the BJP’s OBC Morcha chief, Sunil Bansal, a general secretary and in-charge of West Bengal, Telangana and Odisha, as well as Om Mathur, a Rajya Sabha member from Rajasthan.
However, reports suggest that the BJP leadership is likely to end up picking Smriti Irani. She is known to be aggressive and multi-lingual, traits needed for the job.
The selection process remains under wraps, and no one in the BJP is officially willing to speak on the subject.