Chouhan left out of Par Board as there was one vacancy:Rajnath

BJP President Rajnath Singh today said Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan was not included in the party's top decision-making Parliamentary Board since there was only one vacancy that was filled by his Gujarat counterpart Narendra Modi.
He also rejected suggestions that Modi, one of the main contenders for nomination as BJP's Prime Ministerial candidate, had lobbied for himself or any of his supporters to be included in the new team.
"We had only one vacancy in the Parliamentary Board. There is no doubt that the performance of Chouhan is also excellent. It is very good. But there was only one vacancy and Narendrabhai is the seniormost Chief Minister. It was possible to have only one of them, so we chose Modi," Singh told reporters here.

"Not even once did Modi ask me who was I inducting in the (new) team or discuss the issue with me even once. If I am telling untruth, even Modi will think my party President is speaking untruth. All such reports are baseless," he said responding to a query about Modi's imprint on his team.
Leaders close to Modi including Amit Shah, a former Gujarat Home Minister facing murder charge in two fake encounter cases, and Rajya Sabha MP Smriti Irani were on Sunday inducted in the new team as General Secretary and Vice President respectively.
Asked if the reason former Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha did not find a place in the new dispensation was because he was one of the first to demand the resignation of former party President Nitin Gadkari, Singh said, "Newspaper reports that Sinha was dropped are untrue. He was not a member of any board. He was a member of the National Executive."

To a query if Sinha was ignored for violating party discipline, Singh said, "I can assure you that of all the parties in India, BJP is comparatively the only party with maximum discipline.