Bhupesh Bhagel is Chhattisgarh CM latest updates: After Sunday's Congress Legislature Party meeting in Raipur, Chhatisgarh party president Bhupesh Baghel is likely to be declared the state's chief minister. The decision will be announced a day after four top contenders for the job met party president Rahul Gandhi at his residence in New Delhi.
Along with Baghel, Rahul met with the leader of Opposition in the outgoing state Assembly TS Singh Deo, Lok Sabha MP Tamradhwaj Sahu and Charan Das Mahant at his Tughlaq Lane home in Delhi. Party sources told NDTV UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra were also present at the Congress chief's residence.
Bhagel and Deo are said to be the in the race for the top job.
The announcement also comes days after the Congress' sweeping win in three out of the five states that went to polls, and ended the BJP's rule in Chhattisgarh. Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.
According to reports, Baghel and his counterparts in Rajasthan (Ashok Gehlot) and Madhya Pradesh (Kamal Nath) will take oath as chief ministers in three back-to-back ceremonies on Monday. Baghel's oath-taking ceremony has been planned for 4.30 pm on Monday.
Baghel is known as an aggressive leader who consolidated Congress at a grassroots level after the massacre of top Congress leadership in 2013.
The Congress leader has also been embroiled in a controversy over his alleged involvement in a fake sex CD case. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had filed a charge sheet in September, in which it had named Baghel and a few others as accused.
The controversial CD allegedly featured a state minister, who had rejected it as fake. The BJP has used this case to target the Congress ahead of the polls, while Baghel has pleaded innocence and described it as a political attack.
