Ahmedabad, Sep 13 : Ghatlodia MLA Bhupendra Patel will be sworn in as the new chief minister of Gujarat at 2.20 pm here on Monday.
On Sunday he was unanimously elected by BJP MLAs in Gujarat as their leader to succeed Vijay Rupani. Patel met Governor Acharya Devvrat on Monday and staked claim for being the next Chief Minister of Gujarat.
Union Minister N S Tomar who was one of the observers appointed by the BJP to oversee the selection of the new Gujarat CM made the announcement. He said Patel’s name was proposed by Rupani, who insisted on being the proposer for the new chief minister.
Patel won the Ghatlodia seat with a margin of over 1,17,000 votes against Shashikant Patel of the Congress party. The seat was earlier held by former Gujarat chief minister Anandiben Patel who resigned in 2016 and was later appointed as a governor.
A local BJP leader, with an old association with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, Patel has earlier served in the local municipal bodies. Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani resigned on Saturday as Chief Minister of the state leaving questions over who could be his successor.
Rupani, 65, represents Rajkot West assembly constituency. He had taken over as Chief Minister of Gujarat in August 2016 when Anandiben Patel had quit the office in the wake of the Patidar agitation led by Hardik Patel.
