Pushkar Singh Dhami announced as next Uttarakhand CM

Dehradun, Mar 21: Pushkar Singh Dhami to get a second term as Uttarakhand Chief Minister, announced the Bharatiya Janata Party on Monday.

"Pushkar Singh Dhami has been elected as the Leader of the Legislative Party. I congratulate him, I am confident that under his leadership Uttarakhand will make rapid progress," said Rajnath Singh, Defence Minister and BJP's central observer for Uttarakhand, in Dehradun.

The BJP's dilemma on the choice of a chief minister for Uttarakhand was caused by Dhami's loss in Khatima, a seat he had been winning since the 2012 Assembly polls. However, a section of BJP leaders credit Dhami for the party's big win in the state Assembly polls and want him to be the chief minister again so that he gets a full five-year term to deliver on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's vision of development for the state.

The party which went to polls with Dhami as its chief ministerial candidate won 47 of 70 Assembly seats. Political observers here feel the BJP does not have much scope left for experimentation in Uttarakhand, where it has already experimented on two chief ministers in its last term.

Dhami had been brought in as a replacement for Tirath Singh Rawat towards the fag end of its tenure in July 2021 and his contribution to the party's good electoral performance cannot be overlooked, political analysts said. However, if the party goes for a new face, the necessity to strike a caste and regional balance will be a deciding factor.