Ahead of the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections, BJP’s ally Apna Dal (S) national president Anupriya Patel was on Wednesday inducted into the Prime Minister. Narendra ModiThere was a major reshuffle in the Council of Ministers as the Minister of State for Commerce and Industry at the Centre, the first time since the PM’s second term.
Patel, who belongs to the Kurmi community, has been a minister in the first government led by PM Modi and is an MP from Mirzapur. He had recently met Home Minister Amit Shah, fueling speculations of joining the central team.
The BJP first tied up with Anupriya Patel’s party in 2014 when Shah was the national president of the Bharatiya Janata Party. Some experts called it a “coup to create a dedicated OBC vote base in Uttar Pradesh”.
A report in 2019 said that Patel was made the Union Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare, but was not assigned any important work. All the decisions of the ministry were taken by the then cabinet minister JP Nadda or minister of state Ashwini Kumar Choubey.
Patel was new to the Delhi circuit in 2014, but is a familiar face in UP. The minister is the daughter of prominent Kurmi caste leader Son Lal Patel, who was one of the lieutenants of Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) founder Kanshi Ram.
Later, the two leaders parted ways, after which Son Lal Patel founded the Apna Dal. But his party failed to pay him any electoral dividend, and he never won an election.
Anupriya Patel gave her first life-changing political speech at a memorial meeting for her father, who died in a road accident in 2009. Reports say that the speech caught the attention of Kurmi supporters of his father.
She won her first electoral battle in 2012 and became an MLA from Rohaniya constituency. The constituency is part of the Varanasi Lok Sabha seat from where Narendra Modi is an MP.
He has now dedicated his time demanding a separate ministry to address the problems of Other Backward Classes (OBCs). Addressing his party workers on the 72nd birth anniversary of Apna Dal founder Sonelal Patel four days ago, he said that his party has demanded creation of a ministry for OBCs on the lines of minority ministry to solve the problems of backward classes.
Patel said that the Apna Dal (S) has been continuously raising voice in Parliament for the resolution of farmers’ problems and proper implementation of the Swaminathan Commission’s recommendations so that they can get a fair price for their produce.
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