Fielding top guns in MP shows BJP's frustration with Shivraj?

New Delhi: The decision by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leadership to field three union ministers, four sitting Lok Sabha members and a senior general secretary in the upcoming Madhya Pradesh assembly elections indicates that the ruling party is facing one of its toughest polls in the state.

The BJP has been ruling Madhya Pradesh since 2003 with a brief interruption of 15 months from December 2018 to March 2020 when Jyotiraditya Scindia brought down the Kamal Nath-led Congress government in the state. The Congress had managed to oust the BJP in the 2018 assembly elections though by a thin margin.

Scindia's revolt against the Congress saw Shivraj Singh Chouhan once again becoming the chief minister, a post he has held from 2005 to 2018 and from 2020 till now. He has the record of being the longest-serving chief minister of Madhya Pradesh.

However, the BJP's strategy to continue with Chouhan after the party had lost the 2018 polls under his leadership appears to have proved counterproductive. A fresh face at that time would have given new energy to the BJP and the government.

That is why the ruling party is facing a massive anti-incumbency and the voter fatigue against Chouhan is also at its peak.

By naming the candidature of union ministers Narendra Singh Tomar (Dimani), Faggan Singh Kulaste (Niwas) and Prahlad Singh Patel (Narsinghpur) apart from Lok Sabha members Ganesh Singh (Satna), Riti Pathak (Sidhi) Uday Pratap Singh (Gadarwara) and Rakesh Singh (Jabalpur Paschim) besides general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya from Indore to contest the assembly elections, the BJP leadership has kept the field pen for the chief minister's face and also tried to end the dissidence in the state unit.

It is said that the BJP high command had informed well in advance these eight leaders about their candidature but Chouhan was kept in the dark. The decision came as a big surprise to his camp.

This is not the only indication suggesting that the BJP leadership too has developed a fatigue for Chouhan. Addressing a rally at Bhopal on Monday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi reportedly did not take Chouhan's name even once during his speech. That shows the BJP's frustration with Chouhan and the desperation to return to power in this big central Indian state ahead of the Lok Sabha elections next year.

These indications do not augur well for Chouhan and clearly suggest that he has fallen out of favour now. But it remains to be seen if these top guns help the BJP overcome the huge anti-incumbency prevailing against its government and retain power for one more time in Madhya Pradesh.