The BJP today announced its 80-member National Executive Committee (NEC) with the likes of Varun Gandhi and Birender Singh, who have taken a sympathetic stand with the farmers protesting against three agriculture laws, and Gandhi’s mother Maneka Gandhi being among those replaced with a new crop of leaders. Union Minister of State in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) Dr Jitendra Singh, who is Lok Sabha member from Udhampur-Doda Parliamentary constituency in Jammu and Darakhshan Andrabi, party’s spokesperson hailing from Kashmir have found the berth in the NEC.Prime Minister Narendra Modi, many Union Ministers, including heavyweights like Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh and Nitin Gadkari, and veterans like L K Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi, both of whom being also former party chiefs, are expected in the list released by BJP president J P Nadda.Union Ministers Rao Inderjit Singh and Prahlad Patel, Subramanian Swamy, known for his strong views on a host of issues, Suresh Prabhu, Dushyant Singh, who is the son of former Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje, Vijay Goel, Vinay Katiyar and S S Ahluwalia are among those who have not found a berth in the new list while Union Minister V K Singh is no longer a regular member and has been named as a special invitee.Union Ministers Jyotiraditya Scindia, who left the Congress to join the BJP, Ashwini Vaishnaw and Delhi MP Ramesh Vidhuri are the new names on the list where senior leaders like Piyush Goyal, Dharmendra Pradhan and Nirmala Sitharaman have kept their position.Union Minister of State in the PMO Dr Jitendra Singh and Darakhshan Andrabi have been appointed as only two members to the NEC from Jammu and Kashmir. Earlier, Jugal Kishore Sharma, MP Jammu-Poonch Lok Sabha seat, Dr Nirmal Singh, former Deputy Chief Minister, Shamsher Singh, former Rajya Sabha member and Ashok Khajuria, ex MLC, were NEC members.Special Invitees from Jammu and Kashmir include Priya Sethi and Ghulam Mohammad Mir while Tashi Gyalson, Chief Executive Councilor, Ladakh Autonomous Hill Development Council (LAHDC) Leh is special invitee from Ladakh.Narinder Singh, another prominent BJP leader from Jammu, is already national secretary of the BJP.The decision to drop Varun Gandhi, Rao Inderjit Singh, Swamy and Birender Singh is seen as an indication of the party leadership’s unhappiness with them over their views on a number of issues.While Varun Gandhi has been vocal in prodding the Government to talk with the agitating farmers and has voiced their concerns and sought action in the recent case of violence in Lakhimpur Kheri, Haryana leaders Rao Inderjit Singh and Birender Singh have not been enjoying the best of relations with the BJP establishment in their State.In a recent rally, Rao Inderjit Singh’s remarks were seen as a dig at some of his party colleagues.Union Minister Smriti Irani, who was not in the last national executive, has made a comeback while Harsh Vardhan, Ravi Shankar Prasad and Prakash Javadekar, who were recently dropped as Union Ministers, have retained their place.Six leaders from West Bengal, including actor Mithun Chakraborty, Dinesh Trivedi and Swapan Dasgupta, have made it to the key organisational body of the party with as many of them being made special invitees.Besides 80 regular members, the executive will also have 50 special invitees and 179 permanent invitees, which include Chief Ministers, former CMs, Deputy CMs, former Deputy CMs, national office-bearers and other key party members from States.The executive is a key deliberative body of the party which meets to discuss important national issues and shapes the organisation’s agenda. The disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has prevented its meeting for a long time.Every new party president appoints a fresh team of national executive whose members were selected last time in 2015 by Nadda’s predecessor Amit Shah.The party’s constitution make it mandatory to drop a chunk of existing executive members to make way for new faces.
