A large helping of brahmins, generous helpings from all factions and a bit of “sonrise” is what the new Bharatiya Janata Party state executive is made up of.
The new executive which was announced late on Monday night is dominated by brahmin leaders, making it amply clear that the party now wants to regain its popularity among brahmins.
Apart from a domination of brahmins in the main executive, the youth wing is headed by Harish Dubey while the women’s wing is led by Madhu Misra — also both brahmins.
The other prominent brahmin leaders included in the new committee include Shiv Pratap Shukla, Laxmikant Bajpai (both vice presidents), Hriday Narain Dixit (spokesman), Ram Naresh Agnihotri, Mahendra Nath Pandey, Vinod Pandey (general secretaries) and Major Sunil Dwiwedi (secretary).
The next caste group that has walked away with a sizeable share is Thakurs led by Swatantra Dev Singh (vice president) Satyadeo Singh (spokesman), Daya Shankar Singh, Pankaj Singh (both secretaries) and Narendra Singh Rana (media in charge).
Women, however, seem to have got a raw deal and only eight women have found a place in the executive.
They are Lajja Rani Garg, Premlata Katiyar, Tripti Shakya, Rajni Sareen, Shailsanya Srivastava, Anupama Jaiswal, Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti and Kavita Choudhury.
The paucity of women representation in the state executive indicates that the BJP will have problem finding women candidates for the coming Assembly elections.
The sons of senior leaders who have been included in the state executive include Ashutosh Tandon, son of BJP MP Lalji Tandon, and Pankaj Singh, son of former BJP president Rajnath Singh.