New Delhi Chief Minister, RSS & Punjab

Bhubaneswar: (Ajoy Kumar Misra) The selection of Rekha Gupta for the coveted Chief Minister post in Delhi by the BJP top brass appears to be after the concurrence of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).
Gupta is the first woman chief minister to be appointed in the Modi era of the BJP after Anandiben Patel stepped down from the post in Gujarat in 2016. Unlike other states where women voters are the BJP’s stronghold Delhi, the past decade saw this segment of the electorate align with AAP partly owing to its freebie-based welfarism.
Gupta joins the club of Vasundhara Raje (Rajasthan), Uma Bharti (Madhya Pradesh), Patel and Swaraj as the only woman chief ministers from the BJP. Other than her, India now has only one woman chief minister in the feisty Mamata Banerjee, who is in her third straight tenure in West Bengal. Her selection carries messaging not limited to Delhi but impacting national politics and elections.
With Gupta helming the government in Delhi, the BJP will hope to strike a deeper chord with women, who are not only showing increased electoral participation but have emerged as a key determinant of outcomes in Indian elections in recent years.
Gupta, who is Delhi’s fourth woman chief minister after Sushma Swaraj (BJP), Sheila Diskhit (Congress) and Atishi (AAP), took the oath of office with ministers Parvesh Verma, Kapil Mishra, Manjinder Singh Sirsa, Ravinder Indraj Raj, Ashish Sood and Pankaj Singh.
The swearing-in event was attended by the BJP top-line, from Prime Minister Narendra Modi to his senior cabinet colleagues Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh and J.P. Nadda, who is also the party chief, besides chief ministers of all party and NDA (National Democratic Alliance)-ruled states.
By choosing Gupta, a RSS hand and loyalist of sarkaryavah (general secretary) Dattatreya Hosable, the BJP has once again acknowledged the dominance of the Sangh in government formation. A first-time MLA, three-time councillor and former president of the Delhi University Students Union (DUSU), Gupta, 50, had lost the city’s mayoral polls in 2023 to Shelly Oberoi of AAP.
The choice was between Gupta and Parvesh Verma, Kejriwal’s nemesis in the New Delhi assembly seat and now a prominent Jat face of the BJP in Delhi. The RSS put its weight behind Gupta, though many in the Sangh acknowledge Verma’s contribution and how his decision to contest against and defeat Kejriwal has energised BJP cadre not only in Delhi but around the country. But all permutations aside, Sangh heavyweights wanted a woman as Delhi chief minister—one who would focus on governance and not controversies. Gupta fitted the bill.
A Punjabi-speaking baniya, her selection indicates that the BJP won’t be relenting on the momentum after ousting AAP, which ruled Delhi for a decade with a massive majority, and winning back core saffron voter constituencies.
AAP, despite its loss, retains substantial support among women, baniyas and Punjabis in the national capital. Kejriwal had built a base in the Punjabi community with Narain Dass Gupta, a prominent chartered accountant, being made Rajya Sabha MP twice.
To keep the optics right, the Delhi cabinet, besides Gupta, has two other Punjabi-speaking colleagues in Sood and Sirsa. Last year, the BJP sent trader activist Praveen Khandelwal to the Lok Sabha from Chandni Chowk constituency. With Rekha Gupta as chief minister, the party is looking to accelerate that outreach.
While known for her organisational skills, chief minister Gupta also keeps a low profile and works meticulously. Unlike other Delhi BJP leaders, such as Ramesh Bidhuri, Verma, Sirsa or Mishra, she isn’t remembered to have faced any major controversy. This could make it difficult for the Opposition AAP and Kejriwal to target her.
BJP leaders argue that Gupta’s clean background is ideal script for the party’s pitch to write a new chapter in Delhi’s governance history by aggressively pushing development work and investigations into alleged corruption during AAP rule.
With the party in power both at the Centre and in Delhi, the BJP is looking to deliver AAP a knockout punch by also wresting control of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD). This will make it much easier for the party to deliver governance and welfare. The mayoral elections are scheduled in April. After the recent defections, the BJP’s strength in the 250-member MCD House has risen to 116. AAP has 114 seats and the Congress eight.
Should the BJP win the mayoral election, it will be the party’s sweet revenge for the defeat of Gupta to AAP’s Oberoi in 2023. In the Delhi assembly polls, 11 BJP councillors won their seats, including Gupta. Another councilor, Kamaljeet Sehrawat, had won the Lok Sabha election in 2024 from West Delhi seat.
Delhi polls and governance in the national capital have always had a snowball effect on electoral politics in other north Indian states. In this backdrop, Gupta’s family notably belongs to Jind district in BJP-ruled Haryana while her community dominates towns in the Malwa region of Punjab, where assembly elections will be due in two years and the ruling AAP faces a serious challenge after the drubbing in Delhi.
In Punjab, Gupta’s community has traditionally backed the Congress. The Malwa region is also AAP and Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann’s stronghold. It all makes for a keen contest in the offing. With Gupta as the chief minister of Delhi and a strong ministerial team in Sirsa, Sood and ‘giant slayer’ Verma, the BJP already has a star campaign team ready for Punjab.