The BJP on Thursday appointed Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan as election in-charge for the Bihar Assembly polls later this year and picked environment minister Bhupender Yadav for the same role for the Bengal polls next year.
For Tamil Nadu, due for polls next year, the party appointed Lok Sabha member from Odisha Baijayant Panda as election in-charge and junior minister Murlidhar Mohol as co-in-charge.
Both Pradhan and Yadav are known loyalists of Union home minister Amit Shah and have a formidable record of micro-managing state elections.
The rather belated appointment of Pradhan as the monitor for the Bihar elections, likely to be held in October-November, indicates that the leadership anticipates a tough contest in the state.
Two key leaders — Union Jal Shakti minister C.R. Paatil and Uttar Pradesh deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya — were appointed as co-in-charge to assist Pradhan, indicating a high-stakes electoral battle in Bihar.
BJP leaders said the accumulated anti-incumbency of two decades against ally and chief minister Nitish Kumar could also hurt the party, which is why able poll managers had been selected.
Pradhan has established himself as a skilled strategist in micro-managing elections by setting the right narrative, mobilising the party’s ground cadres and using all means to weaken the Opposition.
Pradhan, who represents the Sambalpur Lok Sabha seat in Odisha, had egged the party leadership on to not enter into an alliance with Naveen Patnaik’s BJD in last year’s Assembly polls. He was credited with having steered the BJP to power for the first time in the eastern state. Pradhan had also overseen the last (2022) Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh and managed the Haryana polls last year.
To assist Union minister Yadav in Bengal, former Tripura chief minister Biplab Kumar Deb was appointed as co-in-charge.
Yadav, like Pradhan, is known for his organisational skills. Yadav has been picked particularly to manage the internal bickering in the Bengal BJP organisation, the insiders said.