The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Uttar Pradesh has made it clear that no office-bearer at the state level or district level would be eligible to contest elections. The party has said that if anyone was keen to contest polls, he or she would have to step down from the party post.
State BJP chief Swatantra Dev Singh has already warned party leaders not to put up hoardings in their respective constituencies and claim their candidature.
According to sources, BJP’s general secretary (organisation), Sunil Bansal made this rule amply clear at a party meeting.
A BJP leader, who was present in the meeting, said that Bansal’s directive became talk of the meeting in which there were ample indications that several sitting MLAs may not get the ticket again.
Party sources said that the performance of the party in the panchayat elections would be one of the factors that would decide the fate of sitting MLAs.
“The MLAs in whose constituency the party fared poorly in panchayat elections may not get a ticket. Besides, reports of the party’s internal surveys about a legislator’s performance, will also be a deciding factor,” a party functionary said.
The BJP, in the past, had declared that relatives of party leaders would not be given a chance to contest panchayat elections. However, the party later gave preference to the winnability factor and willingly gave tickets to sons, daughters and wives of its leaders.
“In politics, rules are made to be broken and finally, it is the winnability factor that ultimately matters. It is only the performance of a legislator that can dilute the anti-incumbency factor. The party is determined to repeat its 2017 performance of 300+ seats and winnability is all that will matter,” said the functionary.