Today in Politics: Amid churn in BJP in UP, Bengal, all eyes on party high command’s next moves

A series of meetings and some social media posts over the last few days have indicated rumblings within the ruling BJP in Uttar Pradesh in the wake of the party’s poor show in the recent Lok Sabha elections. This has led to buzz that the BJP high command may be looking for an organisational rejig in the politically crucial state.

On Wednesday morning, UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath met his ministers to discuss the upcoming Assembly bypolls in the state. In the evening, he called on Governor Anandiben Patel for a “courtesy meet” ahead of the Assembly’s Monsoon Session.

UP BJP president Bhupendra Chaudhary met Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday, sources said, and is believed to have briefed him on a host of issues related to the party’s organisational matters in the state.

On Tuesday, Chaudhary and UP Deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya had met BJP national president J P Nadda separately amid signs of dissonant voices emerging from within the party in the state where it suffered shock losses in the Lok Sabha polls at the hands of the Opposition INDIA alliance parties, the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Congress.

Maurya’s differences with Adityanath, which are widely acknowledged even within the party, came out into the open again after the Deputy CM said at a state party meeting in the presence of Adityanath and Nadda that “organisation is always bigger than government and no one can be bigger than the organisation”. The remark, which Maurya posted on X too, was seen as a message to Adityanath and fuelled speculation of a rift within the party’s state unit.

All eyes would now be on how the BJP top brass will resolve these issues.

Maurya is the BJP’s tallest OBC leader in UP. A large section of OBCs appears to have voted in