Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel on August 18 took a swipe at the BJP over the issue of nepotism as the party named Vikrant Singh, nephew of BJP leader Raman Singh, in its first list of candidates for the 2023 Assembly election.
Mr. Baghel’s remarks on some of the Opposition’s party selections came a day after the BJP released the initial list of 21 candidates. Mr. Raman Singh is Mr. Baghel’s predecessor and BJP’s national vice-president.
“… the most shocking is the ticket given to Vikrant Singh. They say there is no Parivarwad [nepotism] [in the BJP]. But he is the nephew of Raman Singh. So, will Raman Singh and his son lose their tickets from BJP? Vikrant Singh getting a ticket indicates that Raman Singh may not get a ticket,” said the CM while interacting with journalists in capital Raipur.
Mr. Vikrant Singh, the son of Mr. Raman Singh’s sister, is to contest the polls from Khairagarh, a seat that has for the most part been with the Khairagarh royal family. However, after the death of its scion Devvrat Singh, who won on a Janta Congress Chhattisgarh (J) ticket in 2018, it was Congress’s Yashoda Verma who won the seat in the by-election in 2021.
“Firstly, their former Chhattisgarh in-charge and former Home Minister, Ram Sewak Paikra, lost his ticket. Secondly, O.P. Choudhary [ex-IAS officer] who used to wreak havoc has lost his ticket from Kharsia,” the CM added questioning other inclusions and exclusions in the list.
Mr. Raman Singh meanwhile told journalists that Mr. Vikrant Singh had worked his way up during his long association with the party and the selection was based on merit.
Mr. Baghel further questioned the procedure being adopted by the BJP before finalising the list which also contains the name of Mr. Baghel’s nephew and Durg MP Vijay Baghel, who has been fielded from Patan, a constituency the CM has represented multiple times since 1993.
In another election-related development on Friday, the Congress announced various committees including its Election Manifesto Committee, Election Management Committee, Disciplinary Action Committee, and Planning and Strategy Committee. Three of these committees are headed by Cabinet ministers Mohammad Akbar, Tamradhwaj Sahu and Shiv Dehariya.
