Photo of BJP'S 1996 National Executive, Held in Bhopal Office Razed Last Week, Surfaces

Bhopal, Jan 16 (IANS) While the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) two-day National Executive meeting began in New Delhi on Monday, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other top leaders discussing strategies for the Assembly and next Lok Sabha elections, a photograph of the same meet held in the Madhya Pradesh capital in 1996 has surfaced on social media.

The photograph showing Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, flanked by his deputy L.K. Advani on his left and veteran Vijaya Raje Scindia on his right, and other senior leaders like Sushma Swaraj, Uma Bharti, and Kalyan Singh at the BJP headquarters in Bhopal.

But while these leaders are seen either standing or sitting on chairs in a row on the ground floor, but one of the persons present on the balcony maked the photograph more special in the present context. Because, this person is none other but Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The photo was shared on Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha's (BJYM) official Twitter handle, and several individuals, including BJP leaders and journalists, also shared it photograph with captions.

This photograph was taken after the concluding session of the 1996 National Executive meeting and in the subsequent 27 years, a lot has changed within the BJP itself. But, what is another important note of this photograph is that the BJP headquarters - 'Deendayal Upadhyaya Parisar' in Bhopal, where the meeting was held, was demolished just a few days back.

Now, the BJP unit has decided to build a multi-storey party headquarters equipped with high-tech facilities, and this is expected to be ready by next two years. Till then, the party has shifted into a temporary office on government land near Rani Kamlapati Railway station, Bhopal.

Some senior BJP leaders had opposed the decision of demolishing the party headquarters that was built in during the period of then Chief Minister Sundarlal Patwa in 1991. Former Rajya Sabha member Raghunandan Sharma had even written to the party President J.P. Nadda, requesting him to intervene in the matter, but the demolition went ahead.