Punjab Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Sunil Jakhar on Thursday said that he has requested party national chief JP Nadda and Home Minister Amit Shah to relieve him from the post over the dismal performance of the saffron party in the Lok Sabha elections 2024.
Jakhar, while speaking to reporters, said, " I have requested JP Nadda sahib and Home Minister Amit Shah sahib also to relieve me from my responsibilities (as state BJP president) as we could not get any seats in Punjab in the Lok Sabha elections...."
The BJP, under Jakhar's leadership, could not win even a single seat in Punjab in the Lok Sabha elections 2024. In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the saffron party had won two seats - Gurdaspur and Hoshiarpur.
A month ago, several media reports claimed that Jakhar offered his resignation from the post in the party, taking responsibility for the debacle in the state in the General Elections. However, the BJP leadership had rejected the reports about his quitting the post.
The Punjab BJP in late September asserted that Jakhar was leading the party in the state, dismissing as "totally baseless" speculation that he had resigned from his post. Punjab BJP general secretary Anil Sarin dismissed it as "totally baseless and false". He said Jakhar is leading the party's state unit.
Jakhar has been holding Punjab BJP post since July 2023
Jakhar was appointed as the Punjab BJP chief in July 2023, succeeding BJP MLA Ashwani Sharma. He had joined the BJP in May 2022, three months after the Congress lost the Punjab assembly poll. A former Congressman Jakhar served as Punjab Congress chief and as the Leader of Opposition in the Punjab Assembly during 2012-2016. He is the son of former union minister and Lok Sabha Speaker late Balram Jakhar.
