New Delhi: With Prime Minister Narendra Modi on a two-nation visit to France and the United States, Home Minister Amit Shah has been leading the discussions with various stakeholders to decide who is best suited for the post of the chief minister of Delhi.
While electorally, Delhi is relatively a small state with a 70-member Legislative Assembly and seven Lok Sabha MPs, its significance, politically, lies in the fact that it is the national capital, the seat of power. Being in power in Delhi carries significant symbolic value across the country.
It is due to these considerations, and the fact that the BJP has won in Delhi almost after three decades, that Shah, who is the most trusted associate of PM Modi, is meeting various people and taking inputs from multiple functionaries before shortlisting the most suitable among his 48 party MLAs for the post of chief minister.
Both Modi and Shah have a clear idea of how they want to transform Delhi and make it a global capital, which will include beautifying the Yamuna riverfront, curbing pollution, handling vehicle traffic, and investing massively in Delhi’s infrastructure.
For this, they need someone who understands Delhi, can bring people together, is grounded and has the ability to execute big projects within set deadlines. What the BJP will achieve in Delhi in the coming next year will define the party’s perception in the coming decades.
Shah, who, just like Modi, follows a work style of giving a timeline by which he expects the project to be completed or the objective to be achieved, requires individuals and officials who can work under tight deadlines without excuses. He knows that people and the media will expect quick results and hence cannot leave the things to politically immature and overly ambitious leaders.
Some years ago, during a meeting involving senior party leaders of an Eastern state where elections were about to begin, a few top leaders raised the issues and problems they were facing. Shah told them that being from the state, they should have been aware of the solution to the problem rather than asking him for suggestions on how to resolve it.
After this, Shah went on to tell them how the problem can be resolved. The fact that Shah enjoys the complete confidence of PM Modi allows him to move ahead with confidence and even take decisions that are often considered bold and unexpected.
In all the recent elections where the BJP won, Shah, on the advice of Modi, had chosen relatively unknown faces for the post of CM. This approach is attributed to his own long and laborious stint in the BJP, where he rose from the bottom, gaining the ability to separate the proverbial wheat from the chaff.
Shah rarely gets impacted or influenced by lobbying or pressure from prospective candidates and always prioritises the long-term benefit that the decision will bring for the party. This quality was recognised by Modi very early in his political career.
Ever since the party came to power by winning the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, Shah has been at the centre of all decisions, alongside PM Modi. The selection for Delhi’s CM is no different.
