After BJP's Big Win, Grand Reception For PM, Key Meet To Pick Chief Ministers

New Delhi: A day after the BJP's big win in assembly elections, a grand reception will be held today for Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the party's Delhi office that will be followed by a meeting of the party's parliamentary board to discuss the probable names for the post of Chief Minister in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand, where it has won a comfortable majority.

The board will also work on the strategy for Goa and Manipur, where the Bharatiya Janata Party has propelled itself in the game of government formation, even though it has failed to get majority. The party is likely to announce the chief ministers only after Holi.

In UP, where the BJP+ has won 325 of 403 seats, Dinesh Sharma, who had charge of the BJP's membership drive in India, is said to be one of the front runners for the chief minister's post after the party's massive win on Saturday. Union minsters Manoj Sinha, Mahesh Sharma and senior BJP leader Sidharth Nath Singh are also said to be in the race.

In Uttarakhand, according to the BJP sources, possible chief ministerial candidates are Satpal Maharaj, a spiritual guru who left the Congress to join the BJP, Trivendra Singh Rawat and Prakash Pant.
 BJP chief Amit Shah, delivering his victory speech at the party's headquarters in Delhi on Saturday said election results prove that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is the most popular leader since Independence.

"The results are very encouraging for the BJP, we are going to form government in four states - UP, Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur," the BJP chief said, thanking voters and party workers in all five states where assembly elections were held.

He said the results were a victory of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's leadership and the mandate would "take the country's politics in a new direction."      

PM Modi turned the UP contest into a test of his personal popularity and his radical notes ban to eliminate black money. The party's performance in assembly elections is seen as an endorsement of his high-risk decision last November to scrap high denomination 500 and 1,000 rupee notes.

The BJP, along with allies have left  less than a 100 seats to be shared by all other parties.