 "Categorically refused to be Minister of State again, says BJP MP Kulaste")
MP Faggan Singh Kulaste, who did not find a place in Modi 3.0 council of ministers, has said that he had categorically refused to be a junior minister for the fourth time.
I was a Minister of State (MoS) three times. It is not good to become MoS for the fourth time. So, I flatly refused. I said it would be fine if I became a cabinet minister. I have nothing to harbour, said the BJP tribal leader who has won from the Mandla Lok Sabha seat in Madhya Pradesh seven times.
The 65-year-old MP was on Saturday replying to a query about his exclusion from Prime Minister Narendra Modi's council of ministers in the third term of the NDA government. He was at the Niwas area of Mandla where he had gone to thank voters.
ALSO READ: Modi 3.0 kicks off on continuity note: Key ministers retain portfolios
Kulaste was the MoS for Rural Development in the previous government. He was the MoS for Health and Family Welfare during the first of Modi as PM. Kulaste had served as MoS for Tribal and Parliamentary Affairs when Atal Bihari Vajpayee was the PM between 1999 and 2004.
He had contested in the assembly polls from Niwas last year but lost.
His name was once linked with the alleged cash-for-vote scandal wherein three BP MPs, including Kulaste, had waved currency notes in the Lok Sabha in July 2008 during a debate on trust vote on the then PM Manmohan Singh's government.