Amid speculation over the next chief minister of Assam, senior BJP leader from the state Himanta Biswa Sarma met party president J P Nadda and Union Home Minister Amit Shah here on Saturday. Both Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal and Health Minister Himanta Sarma were on Friday called to New Delhi by the BJP central leadership, apparently to discuss the leadership issue of the next government.
Though both leaders from Assam reached Delhi on Saturday morning it was Sarma who reached Nadda’s residence to meet him and BJP general secretary (Organisation) B L Santhosh, sources said. They were later joined by Amit Shah.
It is expected that Sonawal would also reach Nadda’s residence to meet the BJP’s top brass, where a decision on the next chief minister of Assam could be taken. It is immediately not known whether Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be present in the meeting, they added.
Sonowal, who belongs to Assam’s indigenous Sonowal-Kachari tribals, and Sarma, the convenor of the North East Democratic Alliance, both are contenders for the top post of the Assam government.The BJP had not announced a chief ministerial candidate before the Assembly polls in Assam.
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In the 2016 Assembly polls, the BJP had projected Sonowal as its chief ministerial candidate and won, forming the first saffron party government in the northeast. This time, the party has been maintaining that it would decide who would be the next chief minister of Assam after the elections.
In the results announced for the 126-member Assam assembly last Sunday, the BJP won 60 seats while its alliance partners AGP got nine seats and UPPL six.