H Raja to lead BJP in Tamil Nadu for next 3 months

CHENNAI: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Friday appointed a 6-member Coordination Committee to run the party in Tamil Nadu, in the absence of state president K Annamalai.

According to Arun Singh, BJP national general secretary, a six member Coordination Committee headed by former MLA and BJP national executive council member H Raja has been formed to run the party in Tamil Nadu, in the absence of state president K Annamalai.

Also read: Tamilisai extends warm greetings to new TN BJP Coordination panel

This comes three days after Annamalai left for the United Kingdom on a three-month sabbatical.

“Veteran leader and former MLA, H Raja will be the Convenor of the Committee. State vice-presidents M Chakravarthy, P Kanagasabapathi, State general secretaries M Muruganandam, Raama Sreenivasan and State treasurer SR Sekhar will be the members of the committee,” a circular released by Arun Singh reads.

Also read: BJP forms Coordination Committee to run party in TN in the absence of Annamalai

For the next three months (September, October and November), H Raja-led 6 member panel would run the party, after consulting the State Core Committee.

“The Committee will hold discussion with the State Core Committee and will take any decisions about party activities. Each member of the Committee will look after activities in 1 or 2 zones. Annamalai and Raja would allocate the zones to the members of the Committee,” it noted.

With this, H Raja, the former MLA and NEC member again came to the limelight after a decade.

Commenting on this, a senior BJP leader from the Western TN said that the current re-entry of H Raja is due to his closeness with Annamalai and on the recommendation of Annamalai, Raja is given the opportunity.

“H Raja, who was almost sidelined in the party, has now got due recognition. It was Raja who tried hard to become the state president and governor in the past. Although he is the Convenor of the Coordination Committee, Raja will only listen to Annamalai and take decisions. He (Annamalai) hopes that by appointing Raja who has not broken his word as the Convenor, he can overcome the crisis of other leaders including Tamilisai who are against him in the party during his 3-month sabbatical,” the leader told DT Next.

However, Tamilisai Soundararajan extended her warm greetings to the new Committee.

“I would like to convey my heartiest congratulations to the Coordination Committee headed by my brother H Raja, who has been appointed by the BJP national high-command to manage the TN BJP unit,” she said in a social media post.

“Let’s work together and together we will create a record. Let us restore Tamil Nadu in the way shown by our PM Modi,” she noted.