Why did BJP choose Dhami, who lost election, as CM of Uttarakhand?

New Delhi, Mar 21: With Pushkar Singh Dhami to be the Uttarakhand chief minister again despite losing his own seat, the current central leadership of the BJP has opted for stability by continuing with its handpicked leader in the state that has seen frequent change at the helm.

It is also a break from the past as on similar occasions the BJP had earlier preferred to elect a sitting MLA as its chief minister. This is the first time the BJP has gone ahead with someone to lead the government in the state even after the leader lost his own assembly seat.

Pushkar Singh Dhami, who was appointed as CM in July last year and was the third chief minister of Uttarakhand in four months, led the party to a record second straight term in the hill state, with the BJP winning 47 seats out of 70.

It was his ability to check infighting in the state unit, which has six former chief ministers as well as many heavyweights who switched from the Congress, and rally the party to take on Congress that has gone in his favour, BJP insiders said.

Though 46-year-old Dhami lost his own seat of Khatima, many MLAs, including independents, have offered to vacate their seats for him.

According to constitutional norms, Dhami will have to get elected to the state assembly within six months of assuming office.

His loss had put the BJP in a quandary, but after hectic parleys and long discussions of its top brass with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the party preferred continuity over change.

Dhami's reappointment is a message that the party is looking for a stable government in the run-up to the 2024 general elections, party sources said.

"The party has shown faith in the young generation to lead the state and realise the vision of Prime Minister Narendra Modi for Uttarakhand," said Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank, a former chief minister and ex-Union minister who was present in the legislature party meeting that elected Dhami.

In the 2017 assembly elections of Himachal Pradesh, the BJP's chief ministerial face Prem Kumar Dhumal lost his assembly seat but the party won the assembly polls. At that time, the party chose a sitting MLA rather than Dhumal as the CM.

Similarly, in the same year in Goa polls, the party came second with 13 MLAs but it formed the government with the support of several small parties. The BJP chose sitting MLA Pramod Sawant over its sitting chief minister Laxmikant Parsekar, who had lost his assembly seat.

There have also been occasions such as in the 2014 Jharkhand assembly polls where the BJP chose a sitting MLA Raghubar Das as its chief minister over its prominent leader Arjun Munda who had lost his assembly seat.

However, a senior leader in the party said the situation in Himachal Pradesh, Goa and Uttarakhand was different from each other.

In the case of Himachal, the party chose a sitting MLA as it was looking for the next generation of leadership because Dhumal was already in his seventies.

Whereas in Goa, the BJP had to take support from other parties for forming the government and had to keep their preferences in mind, the leader said.