Ahmedabad: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) named Vijay Rupani, a senior Gujarat minister, as the sixteenth CM of the state.

Recognizing the influence of the Patel people group, the BJP named Nitin Patel as dy CM. Both Rupani and Nitin Patel were leaders to replace Anandiben Patel, who resigned as Gujarat CM this week. The decision was taken at a meeting of legislative members attended by BJP chief Amit Shah and Anandiben Patel.

While Rupani had earlier this week ruled out himself from the chief ministerial race saying that he would like to focus on strengthening the organization, Patel had given a few interviews to local channels about how he plans to take the state forward.

On a question about why the change in strategy, union minister Nitin Gadkari at a press conference said that the party followed a democratic process and Rupani’s name had been unanimously decided.

“While Rupaniji may have given his opinion, the final decision on the choice of new CM was arrived at by way of a democratic process. As many as 15 top leaders, all state MLAs and the Prime Minister were involved in the decision making process. It was a unanimous decision,” said Gadkari at the press conference.