On October 5, hours after polling had ended in the state of Haryana, exit polls predicted a loss for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the state. On October 8, as counting began, the early trends reflected the exit polls, favouring the Congress.
But around 10 am, the script flipped with the BJP started gaining numbers and by evening the picture was crystal clear: it had scored 48 seats in a 90-member House, its biggest tally, and romped to a
historic third term.
While congratulatory messages poured in, with many crediting Chief Minister
Nayab Singh Saini for the win, there has been one name that has gone under the radar — Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, who was appointed election in charge of the state.
From ABVP to Modi’s go-to man
This Haryana win isn’t a one-off for Pradhan. He has climbed the party ranks slowly, with his organisational skills making him a trusted lieutenant of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah.
He began his political journey with the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), the student organisation affiliated to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, in 1983 and made his electoral debut in 2000, contesting from Odisha’s Pallalhara. In 2004, he ran for Lok Sabha from Deogarh, a seat previously held by his father, Debendra Pradhan. He lost the 2009 general elections and chose to remain out of direct electoral battles.
But his skills and organisational prowess led him to be appointed as BJP general secretary in 2010 and in 2012, he secured a Rajya Sabha seat from Bihar. In 2014, PM Modi appointed him as Minister of State (In-charge) in the petroleum ministry and promoted him to Cabinet rank in 2017.
His plan of providing over eight million LPG connections to women from below poverty line (BPL) families when he was the minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas also earned him the nickname of ‘Ujjwala Man’.
In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, Pradhan won the Sambalpur seat by a margin of over 100,000 votes and was then appointed as the Union education minister.
A poll whiz
Pradhan’s organisational skills and ability to remain in the background have made him an asset during elections. Over the years, he has emerged as the BJP’s choice of person for difficult states and tough electoral battles.
A measure of his political acumen is the battle for
Nandigram in West Bengal in the 2021 Assembly elections. While the BJP may have lost the polls in the state that year, it was Pradhan’s skills and hard work that led to Suvendu Adhikari trouncing Mamata Banerjee in the constituency by a margin of over 1,700 votes.
Pradhan was also appointed as BJP’s in-charge for the Uttarakhand Assembly election in 2017, a poll that they won comfortably — securing 57 seats in the 70-member Assembly. Five years later, he led the party to another win, this time in Uttar Pradesh. The saffron party registered an emphatic win — of 255 seats in a 403-member Assembly. It was under Pradhan’s watchful eye that Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath became the first incumbent to return to power after serving a full term in the state.
And just months before Haryana’s election, he was appointed as the person in charge for the Odisha elections. It was under Pradhan’s watchful eye that the BJP swept the state, winning 78 seats, and
forming government in the state for the first time.
Pradhan magic in Haryana
With these previous wins in his bag, it was no surprise that the party in June entrusted Pradhan with Haryana — a state where the BJP was struggling with anti-incumbency and disgruntled voters in the form of Jats, farmers and army aspirants unhappy with the Agniveer scheme. This discontent was reflected in the Lok Sabha election results when the BJP lost five of the 10 seats.
However, 55-year-old Pradhan, an OBC face, was determined to turn the tide for the BJP in the state. He joined hands with Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini, another OBC face, to change the voters’ mindset against the party.
Pradhan opted for a ground-centric approach, prioritising direct interaction with local party workers. He built strong ties with the workers on the ground, conducting small and targeted meetings and gathering feedback from them. It was this valuable information that enabled him to draft schemes and pass measures that would change the party’s fortunes in the state.
“He would go to ground zero and hold small meetings… he would take real-time feedback from the workers and inform the leadership and rectify the shortcomings immediately. He also pacified the angry people in Haryana, identified the weak booths and adopted strong workers from other parties,” a BJP leader told NDTV of Pradhan’s efforts.
When disgruntlement arose over ticket distribution, Pradhan quelled the dissent. He’s also credited with denying tickets to many party veterans and sitting MLAs and replacing them with new faces.
When Anil Vij, the party’s senior leader and former minister, staked claim to the post of chief minister during the campaign, it was Pradhan, once again, who stepped in and declared that the party was fighting the election under the leadership of Saini and he will be the chief minister if the party returns to power.
And it seems that the BJP’s trust in Pradhan paid off, with the party making a strong show in Haryana. Now speculation is rife that with wins like this, it won’t be surprising that Pradhan may be Modi’s choice to take the reins of the party, filling in JP Nadda’s big boots.
With inputs from agencies
Link to article –
Dharmendra Pradhan: PM Modi’s trusted lieutenant who charted BJP’s win in Haryana
