BJP choice for Chhattisgarh CM: Meet Vishnu Deo Sai, tribal leader and ex-union minister

Vishnu Deo Sai headed the Chhattisgarh unit of the BJP from 2020 to 2022

Vishnu Deo Sai, a former Union minister and a prominent tribal political leader of Chhattisgarh, has been picked by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) as the chief minister of the central Indian state.

The announcement comes a week after the BJP secured a decisive mandate in the polls contested last month. While speculations were rife that it may opt for the return of veteran Raman Singh as the state's CM, the party eventually decided to pass the baton to a younger leader.

Here's a look at the political journey of Vishnu Deo Sai:

The 59-year-old started his career as a sarpanch, and went on to occupy a seat in the council of ministers during the first tenure of the Narendra Modi-led central government.

Sai comes from a humble background, having being born to a farmer's family in Bagia village of Jashpur district in 1964. In the late 1980s, he entered politics as a grassroot worker of the BJP, and went on to get elected as the sarpanch of Bagia village unopposed.

He made his Assembly election debut in 1990, 13 years before Chhattisgarh was carved out from Madhya Pradesh. He was elected twice from Tapkara Assembly segment between 1990 and 1998.

Subsequently, Sai became a parliamentarian as he won from the Raigharh Lok Sabha seat in the 1999 general elections. He successively retained the constituency in the 2004, 2009 and 2014 elections.

Also Read: Chhattisgarh Election Results 2023: From disarray to sterling victory, this BJP win has few parallels in Indian politics

Between 2014 and 2019, Sai served as the Union minister of state for steel, mines, labour and employment.

From 2019 onwards, Sai shifted his focus to state politics. He was appointed as the BJP's Chhattisgarh unit chief in 2020 -- two years after the party suffered a rout in the Assembly polls. He headed the party's state unit till August 2022, before being replaced by Arun Sao.

In the 2023 Assembly elections, Sai emerged as a potential chief ministerial face after the BJP announced him as the candidate from Kunkuri constituency. He ended up defeating Congress' UD Minj by a decisive margin of 25,541 votes.

Tribal face of BJP

Sai, one of the tallest tribal political leaders in Chhattisgarh, belongs to the Sahu (Teli) community. The members of this section of the tribal community have a significant presence in Durg, Raipur and Bilaspur divisions of the state.

Post-poll surveys suggested that Chhattisgarh's tribal community, which forms 30 percent of the state's population, voted in large numbers for the BJP in the November Assembly elections. The choice of Sai as the CM could further consolidate its votes in favour of the saffron party in the general elections next year.

Sai is the first tribal chief minister of Chhattisgarh after late former CM Ajit Jogi. The latter, however, was ruled out as a member of the Scheduled Tribes (ST) in 2019. "This is the first time a party worker from the tribal community belonging to a farmer's family has been elected as the CM," BJP leader and Union Minister Renuka Singh Saruta told news agency ANI.