Ahead of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections that are scheduled to be held next year, Jitin Prasada, who joined the BJP from Congress in June this year, took oath as a minister in the state Cabinet led by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Sunday.
On 9 June, Prasada had joined the BJP. The Brahmin leader from UP had jumped ship amid the saffron party’s internal worries about the thin representation of the community in the party. His departure was a blow to the Congress party after former Union Cabinet minister Jyotiraditya Scindia had joined the BJP in March 2020. Apart from Prasada, six other BJP MLAs got a berth in the Yogi Adityanath-led cabinet on Sunday.
These six BJP MLAs—Chhatrapal Singh, Paltu Ram, Sangita Balwant, Sanjeev Kumar, Dharmvir Singh and Dinesh Khatik—took oath as ministers of state (MoS) in the Uttar Pradesh government.
Uttar Pradesh Governor Anandiben Patel administered the oath of office to them.This is the fourth BJP-ruled state where a major rejig is happening after Gujarat, Karnataka and Uttarakhand.
Earlier in the month, Bhupendra Patel was sworn in as Gujarat’s new chief minister replacing Vijay Rupani. The entire Gujarat cabinet was changed subsequently.
In Uttarakhand, the BJP had changed its CM three times. After Trivendra Singh Rawat resigned as CM, Tirath Singh Rawat had taken the charge. But he was later replaced by Pushkar Singh Dhami. In Karnataka, B.S. Yediyurappa was replaced by Basavaraj Bommai in July.
The BJP will be fighting next year’s Assembly polls, most likely to be held in February, under the leadership of CM Adityanath. Uttar Pradesh Deputy CM Dinesh Sharma, in an interview with PTI, had earlier said that “the central leadership has already made it clear that the party will contest the election under Yogi Adityanath ji to return to power”.