India News | Ahead of Guj Local Body Polls, BJP Chief Nadda to Meet Leaders

Ahmedabad, Jan 3 (PTI) BJP president JP Nadda and national general secretary BL Santhosh will visit Gujarat on Monday and meet senior leaders of the ruling party in Gandhinagar ahead of local body polls, slated to be held next month.

In a statement on Sunday, the BJP said the two leaders will participate in a meeting to be attended by state BJP unit chief CR Paatil, Chief Minister Vijay Rupani and Deputy Chief Minister Nitin Patel among others.

Nadda and Santosh will arrive at Ahmedabad airport at around 3 pm, it said.

Elections to six municipal corporations, including Ahmedabad, 55 municipalities, 31 district panchayats and 231 taluka pachayats were supposed to be held in November, 2019, a month before their five-year terms came to end, but were postponed by three months in view of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Meanwhile, as the poll scene started hotting up, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) earlier in the day said it will contest all seats in the elections to local bodies, and announced the first list of 504 candidates.

On Saturday, the Bhartiya Tribal Party (BTP), which has two MLAs in the Gujarat Assembly, said it will contest the upcoming local body polls in alliance with the Asaduddin Owaisi-led All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (AIMIM).

Notably, BTP chief Chhotu Vasava had in December announced severing of ties with the Congress party in two district Panchayats in Narmada and Bharuch.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)