Uttarakhand CM meets BJP chief JP Nadda in Delhi; MLA says 'no party legislature meet yet'

Uttarakhand Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat late on Monday met Bharatiya Janata Party president JP Nadda at the latter's residence in New Delhi. This came amid speculations regarding his position in Uttarakhand as reports had earlier been received that mired his situation in a cloud. However, his MLA has dismissed such speculation.

Uttarakhand BJP MLA Munna Singh Chauhan said that a wrong impression is being created about unhappiness over Rawat as Chief Minister. "Trivendra Singh Rawat continues to be the Chief Minister as we speak," Chauhan said. "No official meeting of legislature party meet has been called," he added. 

Top central BJP leaders have also met to discuss the developments. Last week, BJP Uttarakhand held an emergency core group meeting which was attended by observer Raman Singh, Dushyant Gautam, Trivendra Singh Rawat, Ajay Bhatt, Naresh Bansal, Mala Rajya Laxmi, and others.

This had come after BJP's top observers had been rushed to the state, with some MLAs purportedly unhappy and their dissatisfaction allegedly having something to do with Rawat's 'working style.' Amid this, the Budget session of the assembly had been cut-short abruptly. Rawat had also met the senior BJP leaders who had arrived in Dehradun.

Uttarakhand's history of sitting CMs being replaced

Since the formation of the hilly state from Uttar Pradesh in 2000, both BJP and Congress which have ruled the state have often changed their CMs, resulting in their electoral loss in the next election. Nityanand Swami, who was the state's first CM was replaced with Bhagat Singh Koshyari in 2002. On coming to power, Congress chose Narayan Dutt Tiwari - who completed his full term. In 2007, 2009, and 2011, BJP had two CMs Bhuwan Chandra Khanduri and Ramesh Pokhriyal. Similarly, after the 2013 Kedarnath flash-floods, Congress replaced CM Vijay Bahuguna with Harish Rawat culminating in its loss in 2017. Uttarakhand is set to go to the polls again in 2022.