Ahmedabad: According to senior party official and Union Home Minister Amit Shah, who spoke to CNN-News18 in Ahmedabad, Bhupendra Patel will continue to serve as Gujarat's chief minister if the BJP wins a majority in the Assembly elections later this month.
The BJP is seeking the seventh straight term in the state where Mr Shah and Prime Minister Narendra Modi are from, and Mr Shah's comments make it apparent that Mr Patel is the party's nominee for chief minister.
"If BJP gets a majority in Gujarat, Bhupendra Patel will be the next chief minister," Mr Shah told CNN-News18.
Mr Patel replaced Vijay Rupani as the chief minister in September 2021, a move that surprised many, PTI reported.
He is the first-time MLA from the Ghatlodia constituency. He is renominated from the same seat.
Earlier, Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party had declared party leader Isudan Gadhvi as the chief ministerial candidate after conducting a "public survey". Congress has decided not to declare the Chief Minister face for the elections.
Voting for the total of 182 seats in Gujarat will be held in two phases on December 1 and 5. The counting of votes will be taken up on December 8.
In the 2017 polls, the BJP's winning tally came down to two digits at 99 while the Congress bettered its performance by winning 77 seats.
With its aggressive campaign, AAP is projecting itself as the main challenger to BJP in the state, where polls have typically remained a bilateral contest between the saffron party and Congress.