Modi To Address All BJP CMs On Sunday

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address all 13 BJP chief ministers on Sunday evening and he is likely to ask them to focus on the agenda of "good governance and development".

The exercise, which will be attended by party chief Amit Shah and top Union ministers, is being seen as part of his drive to ensure that his governance agenda dominates public discourse and trumps opposition parties' attack on his government over a host of issues.

Besides the 13 chief ministers, the most the saffron party has ever had, five deputy chief ministers and Union ministers like Rajnath Singh, Nitin Gadkari, Sushma Swaraj and M Venkaiah Naidu will be among those present, a party statement has said. Modi's pitch will include the need for them to focus on his development agenda with an emphasis on the poor sections of the society, party sources said.

BJP general secretary Bhupender Yadav said this would be the second meeting of all party chief ministers with Modi since he came to power in 2014. A similar exercise was held in last August.

With the next set of assembly elections due later this year and Modi and Shah already toning up the organisational machinery for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, they are keen to ensure that their development agenda is not overshadowed by other factors.

Only recently in his address to party leaders in the BJP national executive meet, Modi had spoken about the need for India to take a "long jump" to make rapid progress, while Shah had asserted that the saffron party was yet to reach its peak.

All the BJP chief ministers along with their counterparts from other states will be in the national capital on Sunday to take part in the Niti Aayog meeting.

PTI