Union Minister for Rural Development Shanta Kumar is likely to be appointed chairman of the BJP election campaign committee in Himachal Pradesh. An announcement to this effect by BJP president M. Venkaiah Naidu is likely after the latter’s return from an overseas visit on Monday.Elections to the Himachal Pradesh Assembly are due next month.The move is reminiscent of the arrangement worked out by the BJP high command in Gujarat to placate former chief minister Keshubhai Patel. As in the case of Patel and Chief Minister Narendra Modi, there is no love lost between Kumar, who is also a former CM, and Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal.Apart from ensuring peace between the rival factions led by the two senior party leaders during the polls, the arrangement would also ensure a balance betweens the two communities, Brahmins and Rajputs, in the state. Dhumal is a Rajput while Kumar is a Brahmin.Though the BJP had earlier decided to go it alone in the polls, abandoning its ally, the Himachal Vikas Congress, headed by former Union minister Sukh Ram, sources said the party high command is thinking afresh on this. The state BJP had felt that a triangular fight would benefit the party as the HVC would eat into the Congress vote. However, with the Congress now exploring the possibility of re-admitting HVC leaders, including Sukh Ram, to the party, the BJP is most likely to go back on its decision.
