Tuesday, 22 March 2022 | PNS | Dehradun
Puskhar Singh Dhami would take the oath of office as the 12th chief minister of the state for the second consecutive time at a grand ceremony at Parade Ground on Wednesday. The 12 day long suspense over the name of the next chief minister of the state was cleared at the meeting of the BJP legislature party in Dehradun on Monday afternoon. In the meeting the name of Dhami was proposed by the Haridwar MLA and the Bharatiya Janata Party state president Madan Kaushik and it was seconded by other MLAs including those who were in the race of the CM. The Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and the minister of state Meenakshi Lekhi were present in the meeting as the party’s central observers. The former chief ministers Trivendra Singh Rawat, Tirath Singh Rawat, Vijay Bahuguna and Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank, Union minister of state Ajay Bhatt, the Lok Sabha MPs Ajay Tamta, Mala Rajya Laxmi Shah, Rajya Sabha MP and national spokesperson of BJP Anil Baluni, Rajya Sabha MP Naresh Bansal and MLAs were present in the crucial meeting.
As soon as the name of Dhami was announced celebrations started outside the BJP State office. Jubilant supporters of Dhami started shouting slogans and hugged each other. They burst crackers, applied colours on one another and danced to the beats of drums.
The ruling BJP scored a two-third majority in the recently held assembly elections in the state by winning 47 out of 70 assembly seats. However CM Dhami under whom the BJP contested the elections lost from Khatima, the assembly seat he contested from. He was defeated by Bhuwan Kapri of Congress. The defeat of Dhami created a situation of confusion and suspense over the name of the next CM of the state. Names of more than a dozen candidates including Anil Baluni, senior cabinet minister Satpal Maharaj, Dhan Singh Rawat, Madan Kaushik, former CM Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank and Kotdwar MLA Ritu Khanduri were doing rounds in the political circles as probable candidates for the next CM of the state. However the central leadership of the party decided to continue with the young leadership of Dhami in Uttarakhand.
