Amid the ongoing farmers’ protest against the new farm laws brought by its government at the Centre, the UP unit of the BJP has geared up for the panchayat polls in the state. The party’s strategy is to involve everyone, from leaders at the top to the grassroots workers.
A high-level team has been formed for each of the six regions of the state, led by a senior leader as “prabhari” (in-charge), one minister and one local office-bearer. These leaders along with other senior office-bearers of the party have been asked to camp in the districts from January 7 to January 17 and hold meetings with grassroots workers.
Among the prabharis are Daya Shankar Singh for Kanpur and Bundelkhand region; Babu Ram Nishad, chairman of the Backward Welfare Board for Kashi region; party vice-president Prakash Pal for Gorakhpur region, party general secretary Subhash Yadav for Braj region; and general secretary Shankar Lodhi for Awadh region. BJP general secretary Sanjay Rai has been made in-charge of the western region.
“The party has been preparing for the panchayat polls for the past one year,” said BJP vice-president Vijay Bahadur Pathak, who has been made overall in-charge for the party’s preparations for panchayat polls.
The BJP has also formed district level teams that include senior party leader as convener and a sitting office-bearer of the district as co-convener. Teams have also been formed at the 826 block as well as Zila panchayat levels.
A party leader claimed that along with the existing cadre, about 4,000 office bearers and party workers have been roped in from across the state for the polls.
On Monday, a high-level meeting attended by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, BJP in-charge of UP, Radha Mohan Singh, as well as BJP national general secretary Arun Singh took place where they took stock of the poll preparations.
Decision on reserved seats likely this week
The state government is all set to finalise the reservation structure and formula for upcoming panchayat polls in the state. The reservation of seats would be done on rotational basis i.e. the panchayats, which were reserved for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, OBC or for women in 2015, would not be reserved for the same category this time. Sources in the government said that Panchayati Raj Directorate has sent the proposal with the formula for reservation to the government. A senior official said the decision on the reservation in the panchayat polls would be taken this week.
(With inputs from ENS)
This article is auto-generated by Algorithm Source: indianexpress.com
