PM Modi to chair BJP meet today to deliberate on upcoming Assembly polls

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Narendra Modi is to chair the central election committee (CEC) meeting of the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) at party headquarters in New Delhi on Wednesday to deliberate on its candidates for the upcoming state Assembly elections, PTI reported on Wednesday. This will be Modi's first visit to the party office after he chaired the G20 summit in the national capital last weekend. Apart from Prime Minister Modi, home minister Amit Shah and Rajnath Singh, and BJP president JP Nadda are the members of the central election committee.

The meeting's agenda will focus on upcoming Assembly election in Madhya Pradesh only. Names of candidates for Madhya Pradesh Assembly elections could be decided in the meeting. Chhattisgarh was also on the CEC agenda earlier, reported PTI citing sources.

The CEC had met in August and had named candidates for 39 seats for the polls in Madhya Pradesh and 21 for Chhattisgarh. These were for the seats where the party does not have incumbent MLAs. In a departure from its earlier practice, the party has this time begun naming its candidates for Assembly polls long before the dates for the elections are to be announced by the election commission.

Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Telangana and Mizoram are to face assembly elections in November-December, the last round of state elections before the Lok Sabha contest in 2024. Separately, veteran BJP leader B.S Yediyurappa, who is in the national capital to attend the party's central election committee meeting, said he would request the central leadership to appoint at the earliest the Leader of Opposition in Karnataka Assembly and the party's new state president. "I will request for appointment of opposition leader and the party's new state president