Jamshedpur: BJP has announced Vidyut Varan Mahato’s name as its candidate for parliamentary elections from Jamshedpur seat. The announcement was made today in New Delhi soon after the BJP’s Central Election Committee meeting.
And with this announcement, the suspense is finally over. Despite internal rumblings the party has finally decided to go in with Arjun Munda’s political perception and field Vidyut Mahato, who joined BJP formally only today.
For quite a few days, the speculation was doing rounds in Jharkhand that BJP is all set to announce Vidyut Baran Mahato’s name as its candidate from Jamshedpur seat. And this is what happened.
The CEC has ignored the dissenting voices from within party and has chosen to make Vidyut Mahato its candidate.
According to political sources, the intense lobbying by the former chief minister Arjun Munda tilted the balance in Vidyut Varan Mahato’s favour. Arjun Munda met the national president of BJP, Mr. Rajnath Singh in Delhi yesterday and it is learnt that he made a strong pitch for Vidyut Varan Mahato. Mr. Mahato has been camping in Delhi along with Arjun Munda.
Sources say that Vidyuat Mahato had put a condition before the party leaders that he would join BJP only if he is assured that he would be made party candidate from Jamshedpur seat.
According to sources, Arjun Munda apprised the party leaders about the strong presence of Vidyut Mahato in the rural areas of Jamshedpur parliamentary constituency, which have a sizable number of voters from Mahato community.
His calculation is that while Vidyut Mahato would bring in a large number of votes from the rural areas, Narendra Modi’s name would keep the traditional BJP supporters in the fold and this combination would be enough to fight the charisma of Dr. Ajay Kumar of JVM.
According to political sources, the party leadership appreciated the logic behind Arjun Munda’s arguments and chose to go with his perception.