Thiruvananthapuram: P S Sreedharan Pillai has been appointed the president of the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) Kerala unit. Party president Amit Shah on Monday announced Pillai's appointment.
The appointment comes after hectic discussions and speculations that lasted for months. The key position of the party in the state had been lying vacant for over two months after former state president Kummanam Rajasekharan was appointed as the Mizoram governor.
Several other names, including that of BJP state general secretary K Surendran were considered, but Pillai was reportedly preferred in the final stage because he is believed to be not committed to any particular faction in the state unit.
Pillai was picked after party president Amit Shah rejected the proposal by the V Muraleedharan-led faction to appoint K Surendran to the top post. This is the second time Pillai, who had lost the recent Chengannur bypoll, is becoming the party's state chief. During the first stint, he led the BJP in Kerala from 2003 to 2006.
A national executive member of the BJP, he rose through the BJP ranks after starting his political career as an activist of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad. He hails from Venmony in Alappuzha district.
He is known as a veteran lawyer, author and columnist.
It is learnt that former party state president Kummanam Rajasekharan will also be brought back to state politics. The RSS has urged the BJP leadership to field Kummanam in Thiruvananthapuram Lok Sabha seat where, the RSS calculates that his winning chances are high.
The BJP national leadership couldn't immediately agree on a new president after Kummanam vacated the post two months ago. Several discussions to decide on the party chief were held recently between BJP top brass and RSS leadership. BJP’s national leadership had sought to evolve a consensus in choosing the state president, but the faction-ridden party had a tough time selecting one.
Kummanam was despatched to Mizoram as governor in a surprise move that came at the peak of the high-pitched assembly bypoll campaign in Chengannur.
BJP fared badly in the late May election as it came third behind the CPM and the Congress, with a dip of nearly 9,000 in its vote share compared to its vote tally in the 2016 assembly polls. The saffron party could only poll 33,705 this time as against the 42,685 it got in 2016.
The party national leadership's decision to shift Kummanam just before the bypoll backfired as the rival fronts could project it as a sign of the Hindutva party's imminent failure in the bypoll. Kummanam, an RSS pracharak, was appointed the BJP president in 2015, replacing V Muraleedharan.
Muraleedharan gets charge of Andhra
In other appointments, Shah made former Kerala BJP chief and Rajya Sabha member V Muraleedharan, the party in-charge for Andhra Pradesh, where the Lok Sabha and assembly elections are scheduled to be held next year.
Sunil Deodhar, credited for playing an important role in its massive win in Tripura polls, was elevated as national secretary. Deodhar, who was the party's in-charge for Tripura, has been made co-in-charge for Andhra.
