Union minister Sonowal appointed Assam BJP president

GUWAHATI: After the Bihar debacle, BJP has effected a major organizational change for the poll-bound Assam by appointing union minister of state for sports Sarbananda Sonowal as president of BJP in the state. Sonowal replaced incumbent party president Siddhartha Bhattacharya even as the state goes to the polls in next six months.
Union minister of state for environment, forest and climate change Prakash Javadekar announced Sonowal’s new appointment in New Delhi on Saturday.
The organization change came ahead of BJP national president Amit Shah’s visit to the state on November 25. Shah will address party workers at a rally in Dibrugarh.
Javadekar also said that Sonowal has also been made head of the BJP’s state election management committee, while Bhattacharya has been given the charge of party’s national spokesperson for Northeast states and vice chairman of the election management committee.
“BJP is readying for the 2016 assembly polls in Assam. Appointment of new president is part of our poll preparation,Javadekar said in New Delhi.
BJP MPs Rajen Gohain and Ramen Deka are two other vice chairmen, while former Congress heavy weight and newly inducted BJP member Himanta Biswa Sarma is convener of the committee.
Other BJP parliamentarians-- Bijoy Chakraborty and Kamakhya Tasha, party leaders Rajdeep Roy, Vijay Gupta and Sayed Mominul Awal are members of the committee.
“I am grateful to our leadership for entrusting me the task of party president in the state. I will take along all our party workers and leaders together for BJP’s victory in the assembly polls,” Sonowal, who also served as state party president during the Lok Sabha polls last year said.
BJP central leaders said that the change in state leadership has to be made following Bhattacharya ended his term on October.
Many of the state BJP leaders including some of the MPs expressed their unhappiness over Bhattacharya’s “style of functioning” and wanted that his term should not be extended.
Also according to BJP insiders, the fiasco in Bihar had led the central leaders to go for organizational change by appointing Sonowal as president of the party as well as head of the election committee. They said that unlike in Bihar, central leaders have hinted that Sonowal could be the chief ministerial candidate by making him the head of the election committee.