The state unit of the BJP, which is hosting the party’s national executive beginning here Thursday, is facing a piquant situation.
Top party leaders, who will be arriving in the state capital from Thursday to attend the national executive meeting, are insisting on being provided suites in five-star hotels during their stay here and the problem is that apart from a limited number of luxury hotels in Lucknow, the hotels do not have adequate number of suites to meet the demand.
“The party has decided not to seek the hospitality of the Mayawati government for its chief ministers and this has increased the number of guests in our priority list. Now more and more leaders are demanding suites for their stay and it is difficult for us to comply with their request,” said a party leader.
The party has already arranged for suite accommodation for senior party leaders, including Mr L.K. Advani, Ms Sushma Swaraj, Mr Nitin Gadkari, Mr Arun Jaitley, Dr Murli Manohar Joshi, Mr Ravishankar Prasad and Mr Ananth Kumar. Mr Rajnath Singh will stay in his own bungalow in Lucknow.
Apart from this, suitable accommodation in five-star hotels has been arranged for chief ministers (of BJP-ruled states) Narendra Modi (Gujarat), Raman Singh (Chhattisgarh), Prem Kumar Dhumal (Himachal Pradesh), B.S. Yeddyurappa (Karnataka), Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank (Uttarakhand), Shivraj Singh Chouhan (Madhya Pradesh) and Sushil Kumar Modi (deputy chief minister of Bihar).
According to party sources, the demand for “suitable” accommodation (read suites) has come from the party’s central office for senior party leaders like Mr Venkaiah Naidu, Ms Vasundhara Raje Scindia, Ms Smriti Irani, Ms Hema Malini, Mr Shatrughan Sinha and Mr Yashwant Sinha.
“We are having a problem in accommodating mediapersons who are coming in from outside and other party leaders also. We cannot take state-owned guest houses for obvious reasons,” admitted party leader.