Chandigarh, July 20-BJP president JP Nadda appointed senior Haryana leader and former minister Om Prakash Dhankar as new state president of the party on Sunday. A party communication said the appointment of Dhankar is with immediate effect.
The term of current president and former MLA Subhash Barala has already ended and the party was looking for his replacement. Dhankar and Barala had both lost the last assembly elections in the state, along with several other ministers and senior leaders.
Dhankar, who held several key portfolios in the first term of Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar, has positions in the state organisation and the national level , including chief of the BJP’s Kisan Morcha.
Haryana Chief Minister Khattar had recently met Nadda and discussed the issue of the appointment of new state unit chief. Several names were considered but Dhankar was chosen in mind the caste considerations in Haryana.
Notably, names of Jat leaders like former finance minister Capt Abhimanyu and former agriculture minister OP Dhankar were also considered for the coveted seats of Rajya Sabha earlier this year, but none of them got the ticket, causing much heartburn in the community.
Haryana Chief Minister Khattar offered his congartulations to Dhankar.
“I am completely confident that with cadres will benefit from your poltical experience and the Haryana BJP will emerge stronger in terms of organisation,” Khattar said in a tweet in Hindi.
