JP Nadda, Jai Ram Thakur frontrunners in BJP race for Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister

NEW DELHI: Union Health Minister JP Nadda and former state minister Jai Ram Thakur are the frontrunners for the BJP's Chief Ministerial pick for Himachal Pradesh, sources have said. The search for a CM face for the hill state after the party's CM candidate PK Dhumal lost in Sujanpur, and its state president Satpal Singh Satti lost in Una.

The BJP parliamentary board met on Monday evening to decide on who would lead its government in Himachal Pradesh. The party had displaced the ruling Congress government, winning 44 of the 68 seats, which is a shade short of an absolute majority.

Jai Ram Thakur won from the Seraj constituency in Mandi District, beating the Congress candidate by a margin of about 11,000 votes. He had served as a minister for rural development and panchayati raj in the previous BJP government in Himachal Pradesh.

Jagat Prakash Nadda has been part of the Narendra Modi Cabinet since 2014, and is considered to enjoy the trust of PM Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah.

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The BJP was faced with a similar question over the chief ministership after its close victory in Goa in March 2017. Its incumbent Chief Minister and CM hopeful Laxmikant Parsekar had lost his reelection bid. Former Goa CM Manohar Parrkiar, who was Union Defence Minister at the time, had returned to Goa to take charge as CM.

Parrikar had quit as Goa CM to join the Centre as Defence Minister in November 2014, as part of PM Modi's first Cabinet reshuffle.

The Modi-Shah combo is also no stranger to moving the party's established New Delhi hands to chief ministerial posts after state assembly victories. An example of this was the choice of then Lok Sabha MP Yogi Adityanath for the post of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister after the BJP's massive victory in March.