With speculations of a cabinet expansion of the Yogi Adityanath Government in Uttar Pradesh on the cards the ruling BJP, which is aiming to win all 80 seats in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections, can give six seats to its allies in the state.
The issue of seat sharing with alliance partners was discussed at a meeting of the BJP Central Election Committee held on Thursday on the preparations for the elections.
While the outcome of the meeting has not been officially announced as yet, in Lucknow, speculations of a cabinet expansion gained momentum after Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath rushed to meet Governor Anandiben Patel at the Raj Bhawan this noon after arriving from New Delhi.
Officials, however, maintained that it was just a courtesy call and CM Yogi presented a book titled “Rom-Rom me Ram” to Governor Anandi Ben Patel.
Yesterday, the chief minister attended a high-level meeting of the BJP in Delhi called to finalise the list of Lok Sabha candidates that concluded at midnight.
On the cabinet expansion, reports say that the new entrant RLD, along with Om Prakash Rajbhar of SBSP and BJP MLC Dara Singh Chauhan could get berths. The RLD is expected to get two ministerial posts.
On the outcome of the meeting, sources hinted that the BJP could give two seats each to the RLD and the Apna Dal and one seat each to the Nishad Party and SBSP of Om Prakash Rajbhar.
Party sources say before the notification for the Lok Sabha elections, the list of more than a hundred candidates will be declared by next week and the candidates for about 250 seats will be declared by March 10.
Before the meeting of the Central Election Committee, a panel of candidates for 300 seats in 21 states is formed by the BJP leadership.
During the meeting, it was decided not to declare candidates in Punjab, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu until talks on alliance are finalised.