Post-Lok Sabha Elections | As rumblings in UP BJP get louder, state unit chief meets PM

Amid the rumblings within the BJP in Uttar Pradesh, state party president Bhupendra Singh Chaudhary met Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the Capital on Wednesday.

The meeting came a day after Chaudhary and the state’s Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya met BJP national president J P Nadda separately on Tuesday.

There have been signs of dissent emerging in the BJP’s state unit after the party’s poor show in the Lok Sabha elections — the BJP’s tally fell from 62 out of 80 seats in UP in 2019 to just 33. The Samajwadi Party (SP) edged past the BJP with 37 seats; the Congress won another six in alliance with the SP.

Earlier in the day, Maurya reiterated his statement that the sangathan (party/ organisation) is bigger than the government. “Sangathan sarkar se badaa hai; karyakartaon ka dard mera dard hai; sangathan se koi badaa nahin, karyakarta hi gaurav hai (The party/ organisation is bigger than the government; the pain of party workers is my pain; nobody is bigger than the party/ organisation; the party worker is our pride),” he posted on X.

He had made similar comments — seen as a veiled attack on Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, suggesting that he was ignoring party workers and running the state through the bureaucracy — at a state party meeting earlier, which was attended by Nadda, where Adityanath had blamed “over-confidence” for the electoral reverses in the state and suggested that the party could not effectively counter the INDIA bloc’s campaign.

According to sources, the BJP’s central leadership has told Maurya that leaders should avoid making statements that may affect the party’s future prospects. With the party’s top brass speaking to both Maurya and Chaudhary, they seem to be taking steps to put their house