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Journalism of Courage
With the BJP holding on to Gujarat with its highest margin ever, the spotlight is on the role its state chief Chandrakant Raghunath Paatil, popularly known as CR Paatil, will assume going forward.
Paatil, who was appointed state chief in July 2020, first set a target of winning “all 182 seats” in the state. The party went on to reconfigure this around the 1985’s Congress’s record of 149 seats, and eventually surpassed the count by winning 156, including the seven in the Navrasi Lok Sabha constituency that Paatil represents.
BJP functionaries that spoke to The Indian Express said they believed that the party high command will certainly be giving Paatil “a bigger role, most probably at the national level”.
Seen as Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s man in Gujarat, Paatil rapidly brought in changes to the state’s party unit to focus and shape its grassroots party workers after his appointment. He constituted page committees (a group of party workers or supporters on each page of a voters’ list of a constituency) to oversee voters at a local level. The BJP has now replicated the model in other states. His imprint was also visible in things such as the newly fashioned saffron caps party leaders sported this campaign season.
The huge exercise of changing the Vijay Rupani government in September 2021, and replacing it with the Bhupendra Patel government, was done under Paatil’s supervision.
Paatil was also the first party state leader to address the media after the emphatic victory. In his speech in Hindi, Paatil announced that Bhupendra Paatil would be the next Chief Minister of Gujarat.
Forecasting a clear and bigger role for Paatil in coming days, a senior party leader said, “Paatil has proved himself. The results show that. Being someone of Marathi origin, he has led the party in Gujarat to such a historic victory. It’s an achievement. He has taken the micro-level management of elections to the next level through effective use of page committees.”
The leader added: “It seems that the party will continue him as Gujarat chief at least till the 2024 Lok Sabha elections and then may move him to some other role.”
Calling him one of the “main reasons” for the BJP’s victory, a party leader said, “While Modi was definitely key for the party’s victory, the role played by Paatil cannot be ruled out. He has done a commendable job as party president while getting this historic and immortal win. He is clearly due for a reward by the party. That reward could be anything. Only time will tell.”
A source in the BJP said Paatil could even “get a ministerial berth in the Union cabinet after the 2024 Lok Sabha elections”.
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