Caste, electoral equations to be in focus in Uttar Pradesh cabinet expansion

Lucknow: Electoral and caste equations are likely to be in focus in the selection of ministers in the Yogi Adityanath cabinet, which is likely to be expanded in the next few days.

Speculations about the possible cabinet expansion gained momentum after a meeting of the BJP core committee took place at the chief minister’s residence on Tuesday evening. Newly appointed state unit president Pankaj Chaudhary, Adityanath, his two deputies Keshav Prasad Maurya and Brijesh Pathak, senior party and RSS functionaries were present there.

According to the sources in the state BJP here, the state cabinet could be expanded around Makar Sankranti next month.

There are currently 54 ministers in the state council of ministers. As the state can have 60 ministers, there are six vacancies in the cabinet.

Sources said that western Uttar Pradesh could get more representation in the expansion and former state party president Bhupendra Chowdhary could be included as a minister. Influential ‘Gurjar’ community leader Ashok Kataria could also get a place in the ministry.

Besides, the saffron party is also likely to include some ‘brahmin’ faces in the ministry in an apparent bid to placate the MLAs of the community who had recently held a meeting here to discuss what they termed ‘marginalisation’ of the community in the caste politics of the state.

Rebel Samajwadi Party (SP) MLA Manoj Pandey, a Brahmin, has emerged as a strong contender for a ministerial berth. The other names doing the rounds included those of Sadhvi Niranjana Jyoti, who hails from the ‘Nishad’ (OBC) community, Govind Narayn Shukla and Mahendra Singh.

Sources said that some ministers might be shifted to the party organisation.

Besides one minister, each from the BJP alliance partners, Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) and Apna Dal (AD) were also likely to be included in the council of ministers.