Swami Prasad Maurya, 68, a prominent non-Yadav OBC face in Uttar Pradesh politics, who quit the cabinet on Tuesday, is said to be heading to the Samaiwadi party (SP).
While SP chief Akhilesh Yadav was quick to post a photograph with Maurya on Twitter, it’s a big leap for someone who has spent a career taking on the SP — for two decades as a member of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and the last five years in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), as a Cabinet minister in the Yogi Adityanath-led government.
Maurya even fielded his daughter Sanghmitra, a current BJP MP from Badaun, in the 2014 Lok Sabha poll as a BSP candidate against SP founder Mulayam Singh Yadav.
Maurya, once a close confidant of BSP chairman Mayawati and the outspoken face of the party, was not only appointed as a minister in every BSP government in 1997, 2002 and 2007, but was also the leader of the opposition every time the BSP stepped down. He was even named BSP national general secretary, effectively making him Mayawati’s number two in the party hierarchy.
Complete News Source : The Indian Express
