Hours after tweeting that E Sreedharan, India's 'metro man', would be BJP's chief ministerial candidate for next month's Kerala Assembly election, Union Minister V Muraleedharan issued a clarification. On March 4, he told news agency ANI that the party had not yet taken a final decision. Earlier in the day, Muraleedharan had tweeted, "Kerala BJP will fight Kerala polls with E Sreedharanji as its chief ministerial candidate”. That tweet has been deleted now. BJP's decision to project Sreedharan as its chief ministerial candidate is contrary to an "unofficial" rule in the party - that nobody over 75 can be considered for a ministerial berth or role & Sreedharan will turn 89 in June. However, BS Yediyurappa was 76 when he was sworn in as Chief Minister of Karnataka in 2019. Sreedharan said he was expecting a "big" win in the election & that he had "made only one demand" - "I want to contest in a constituency not far from Ponnani where I am residing now”. Last month he said he could not achieve his goals for Kerala "unless I am Chief Minister". Kerala will vote in a single phase on April 6 with results due on May 2.
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