As Vardhan’s star rises, BJP tries to bring around Goel, BJP Delhi CM Candidate, Delhi CM, Vijay Goel, Harsh Vardhan, BJP Declare their CM candidate, BJP, Delhi Poll 2013.

As Vardhan’s star rises, BJP tries to bring around Goel.

NEW DELHI: Efforts are on to persuade DelhiBJP chief Vijay Goel to agree to step aside as a likely chief ministerial candidate in the "best interests" of the party with the central parliamentary board likely to meet on either on Sunday or Monday.

The BJP parliamentary board is expected to name former Delhi health minister Harsh Vardhan as BJP's chief ministerial choice and senior leaders are working on Goel to accept the writing on the wall and shelve his reported threats to resign if his claims are ignored.

Sources said Goel's assertions that he is the only fit candidate to take on chief minister Sheila Dikshit and that this is borne out by opinion polls has gone down badly with the central leadership, especially as the defiant comments came on the very day that BJP issued a statement saying no decision had been taken on a CM nominee.

Goel's "The party is ahead and so am I" quip has considerably damaged his effort to prevent Vardhan being named as a CM candidate. His refusal to public restrain himself on the CM issue has only helped senior Delhi leaders argue that Goel is not capable to working in a consensual manner.

The recalcitrant BJP state chief has been threatening to "seek justice" if he is over looked, but the BJP central leadership is now clear that it is not going to wait much longer for Goel to come around. "If he doesnt agree, the party is going to go ahead any way," said a senior party leader.

The parliamentary board has 12 senior leaders including L K Advani, Narendra Modi, Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley, Rajnath Singh and Nitin Gadkari.

Party sources said the buzz over a possible board meeting has put party state president Vijay Goel on high alert. Goel, who is keen to be declared as chief ministerial candidate but fears losing the race to Dr Harsh Vardhan, is learned to be doing rounds of senior leadership to push his case.

In last few months, Goel has faced consistent opposition from several senior leaders of the party's Delhi unit who have shown a clear preference for Vardhan as the chief ministerial face during discussions with senior leadership. Vardhan is also supposed to have a strong support of the RSS.

To counter this Goel's supporters have been citing surveys that show him to be more popular leader than Vardhan. Sources said Goel had even threatened to resign if he is being sidelined at this juncture.

"A new face with barely 45 days remaining to the poll can harm party's prospects. It may lead to a repeat of 2008 when the party at last minute brought in a new face sidelining the state president," said a Goel supporter.

On Thursday, a handful of Goel supporters had staged a protest at BJP national office against the possible appointment of Vardhan as chief minister which left senior leadership fuming. On Friday, both Goel and Vardhan attended party's campaign committee meeting held at party's poll in charge Nitin Gadkari's house. Sources said after Thursday's debacle Goel maintained a low profile at the meeting.

Meanwhile, party's central election committee is also expected to meet in the coming week to clear the first list of 35-40 odd candidates that has already been sorted at the state level.

"The first meeting of the central election committee is expected to be held on Sunday to clear the list of candidates for Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and also Delhi if the time allows. However, the decision over Delhi's chief ministerial candidature is expected only by Monday when the parliamentary board sits," said a senior party leader.

source:TOI

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