Vishnu Deo Sai – tribal leader and former Union Minister – is the BJP’s pick as the next Chief Minister of Chhattisgarh in the run-up to 2024 general election. This afternoon, he was elected as leader of the BJP’s legislative party at the meeting of the 54 newly-elected MLAs.
The selection – made after a week of confabulation — is along the lines of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s idea of having a tribal leader as the Chief Minister of the state, where tribals form 32 per cent of the population. They are the largest population group in the state after the Other Backward Classes.
The BJP, never on the top of tribals’ list of favourites, has managed to turn around the mood and corner all 14 assembly seats in the tribal-dominated Surguja region and eight of the 12 seats in Bastar.
Mr Sai, 59, is also known to be favoured by the party’s ideological mentor Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. Additionally, he is close to former Chief Minister Raman Singh, who so far was the party’s tallest leader in the state.
The four-term MP =– who has been the president of the Chhattisgarh unit of the party from 2020 to 2022 — is known for his organisational capability and has a non-controversial image.
Previously, he has been a member of the BJP National Working Committee. When the Narendra Modi government came to power in 2014, he was named as the junior minister for steel.
Addressing a poll rally in the Kunkuri last month, Union Home Minister Amit Shah had asked the voters to elect Mr Sai, promising to make him “big man” if the party comes back to power in the state.
The BJP won 54 seats in the 90-member Assembly in the recently held assembly election and wrested power from the Congress, which was reduced to 35 seats from the 68 it won in 2018.