BJP to elect its legislature party leader in assembly on Sunday

Jammu, Nov 2: The BJP’s J&K unit will hold a meeting in Srinagar on Sunday to elect its legislature party leader ahead of the first assembly session in the Union Territory to be held on November 4 after a six-year gap.

The BJP bagged its all-time high of 29 seats in the recently held J&K Assembly elections.

However, its MLA Devender Singh Rana, who won the Nagrota assembly segment by a margin of over 30,000 votes and was a frontrunner for the leader of opposition post because of his political stature within the party, died on Thursday following an illness.

Known as the “voice of Jammu”, he quit the National Conference along with his close associate and former minister S S Slathia and joined the BJP in October 2021.

Last month, the BJP’s parliamentary board appointed Union Minister Pralhad Joshi and the party’s national general secretary Tarun Chugh as observers to elect the legislature party leader in Jammu and Kashmir.

According to BJP sources, the meeting will take place in Srinagar on Sunday morning and will be attended by all 28 MLAs and senior party leaders, including its Jammu and Kashmir unit chief Ravinder Raina.

They said the leader of the opposition will be chosen at the meeting, and the name will be forwarded to the party’s central leadership.

Five names are under active consideration but things will be cleared once the meeting takes place, the sources said.