Big jolt to Uttar Pradesh BJP

Lucknow: In a jolt to the BJP in poll-bound Uttar Pradesh on Tuesday, OBC leader Swami Prasad Maurya resigned from the state cabinet while three other MLAs announced they are quitting the party.

Maurya, who is expected to join the Samajwadi Party (SP), said he resigning from the Yogi Adityanath cabinet due to "gross neglect" towards Dalits, backwards, farmers, unemployed youth and small traders.

BJP Tindwari MLA Brajesh Prajapati, Tilhar MLA Roshan Lal Varma and Bilhaur MLA Bhagwati Sagar have announced they are leaving the party in support of Maurya. There was no immediate word on the resignations being accepted. On Twitter, Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya urged the leader to reconsider his move.

"I don't know for what reasons respected Swami Prasad Maurya has tendered his resignation. I appeal to him to sit down for a talk. Decisions taken in a hurry often prove wrong," he said in a tweet in Hindi.

The SP tweeted a photograph of Swami Prasad Maurya and Varma with party chief Akhilesh Yadav, and said in Hindi, "Welcome to the Samajwadi Party. There will be a social justice revolution. There will be a change in 2022."

In his resignation letter addressed to Uttar Pradesh Governor Anandiben Patel, Maurya said, "I discharged my responsibilities as the minister for labour, employment, and coordination in the council of ministers headed by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, despite adverse circumstances and ideology."

"Due to the attitude of gross neglect towards Dalits, backwards, farmers, unemployed youth and small and medium-sized traders, I am resigning from the Yogi ministry of Uttar Pradesh," he said in a tweet in Hindi.

Maurya, who hails from the other backward class (OBC) community, had crossed over to the BJP from the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) before the 2017 assembly polls. He is a five-time MLA from Padrauna, while his daughter Sanghmitra Maurya is a BJP MP and represents Badaun in the Lok Sabha. In a tweet, Yadav said, "This time all the oppressed, downtrodden, neglected will unite against the BJP's insulting and divisive politics.

"There will be a revolution of SP's politics of giving respect to all. In 2022, with everyone meeting each other, there will be positive politics of 'mela hobe'. There will be a historic defeat of the BJP," he said.

The setback to the ruling party came on a day when a key BJP meeting to discuss the Uttar Pradesh assembly polls, now just a month away, was taking place in Delhi. Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Adityanath and Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya attended the meeting, as the party begins shortlisting its candidates.

The Uttar Pradesh polls will be held in seven phases -- on February 10, 14, 20, 23, 27, March 3 and 7. The results will be declared on March 10 along with the four other poll-bound states of Punjab, Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur. Speaking to reporters here, Swami Prasad Maurya said, "I am a political person and I will be talking to some political party or the other. With whom I will talk, it will be done after consulting supporters."