The Madhya Pradesh BJP on Wednesday released a list of its star campaigners for the bypolls with complete focus on local leaders.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah or even BJP national president J.P. Nadda do not feature on the star campaigner list despite the bypolls being crucial for survival of the seven-month BJP government in the state.
Interestingly, Rajya Sabha member Jyotiraditya Scindia, who was instrumental in formation of BJP government in the state in March this year, appears only at number 10 in the list headed by state BJP president Vishnu Dutt Sharma. Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan appears at number two.
Lesser known names in Madhya Pradesh like BJP vice-president Dushyant Kumar Gautam who has been associated with the SC wing of the party for long, take far more precedence over Scindia in the list. Union Ministers Narendra Singh Tomar, Thawar Chand Gehlot and Dharmendra Pradhan and ex-chief minister of MP, Uma Bharti, also precede Scindia in the list.
While the Congress has again taken a jibe at what it called intentional sidelining of Scindia by his new party, BJP has said that the party works according to its own rules and guidelines in such matters.
Congress spokesman K.K. Mishra said in a tweet that how times change is evident by the fact that Scindia, who was election campaign chief while in Congress, had descended to number 10 among BJP star campaigners. He also questioned the absence of Bhopal MP Pragya Singh Thakur from the list.
MP Congress committee chief Kamal Nath’s media coordinator Narendra Saluja pointed out in the tweet that none of Scindia supporters, too, had found a place in the star campaigner list. “He (Scindia) is missing from the BJP digital raths too. He was chief of the Congress campaign committee. What state has he been reduced to in BJP,” Saluja tweeted.
BJP spokesman Rajnish Agrawal retorted saying that if Congress had been so sensitive and conscious about Scindia’s honour while he was in the Congress, then the party would not have to face the current situation. He said that the BJP works according to its own rules and guidelines in such matters and this also applies to national leaders not getting involved in bypoll campaigns.