Rekha Gupta, a newly elected MLA from Shalimar Bagh, has been appointed as the leader of the BJP legislative party and is set to take the oath of office as the Chief Minister of Delhi on February 20. This announcement was made during a meeting of the newly elected BJP MLAs on February 19, attended by central observers Ravi Shankar Prasad and Om Prakash Dhankar.With the BJP winning 48 seats in the recent Assembly elections, the party is poised to establish a government in Delhi for the first time in 27 years, succeeding the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), which secured 22 seats. At 50 years old, Gupta triumphed over AAP’s Bandana Kumari by a significant margin of over 29,000 votes in the elections held on February 5. This victory marks a notable turnaround after two previous unsuccessful attempts in 2015 and 2020 against the same rival.
Gupta will become the fourth woman to serve as Chief Minister of Delhi, following Sushma Swaraj from the BJP, Sheila Dikshit from Congress, and Atishi from AAP. Expressing her gratitude for the confidence placed in her by the party leadership, Gupta remarked in a statement, “This trust and support have given me new energy and inspiration. I pledge to work with honesty, integrity, and dedication for the welfare and development of every citizen of Delhi.”Born on July 19, 1974, in Nandgarh village of Jind district, Haryana, Gupta relocated to Delhi with her family in 1976. Her political journey began during her time as a student at Delhi University, where she was actively engaged with the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, the student wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). Gupta’s affiliation with the BJP started in the early 2000s when she became a member of the party’s youth wing. Her husband, Manish Gupta, and her mother-in-law expressed their joy to the media regarding her new appointment.
