Dissatisfaction among the BJP ranks came out into the open immediately after the oath was administered to 16 cabinet and 24 ministers of state at the Raj Bhawan yesterday.
Most of them were surprised at the removal of the old timers and the induction of new faces into the ministry.
The BJP office saw continuous slogan shouting against Kalraj Misra, Lalji Tandon and Murli Manohar Joshi. The supporters of Ram Kumar Verma, a former minister and senior BJP leader, sat in dharna outside. Verma apologised to the new party president, Rajnath Singh, saying that his supporters action was totally against the BJP tradition.
Others shouting slogans included supporters of Surya Prakash Sahi from Deoria, a former minister, and those of Ashok Dube, the MLA from Etawah. Dubes supporters said he was the person who has been fighting against Mulayam Singh Yadav and nobody from the district had been inducted into the ministry. How will the fight against Mulayam continue, they asked.
Indeed, the political aspect of ministry formation has been overlooked by both the BSP and the BJP. They have not raised the status of anyone in the district of Etawah and Barabanki, the home districts of Mulayam Singh and Beni Prasad Verma.
Beni Vermas son was defeated by Mahfooz Kidwai, son of Late Rafi Ahmed Kidwai. He is senior enough to be taken in the ministry, but his claims were overlooked by the BSP. No one has been inducted from the district.
The BJP did not induct anyone from Etawah. Also, they did not sufficiently project their upcoming Yadav leader, Ashok, who was only given a rank of minister of state.
The cabinet has not been able to give any challenge to Mulayam, the arch enemy of the BSP-BJP combination.
The ministry has only a few old faces. Most of them have served in the earlier ministries of Kalyan Singh and Mayawati. The bulk of the ministry is constituted by newcomers.
There is large representation of the backwards and the scheduled castes.
The representation of the upper castes has come down.
There are four Muslims, three in the cabinet and one as minister of state. Late Brahma Dutt Dwivedis wife has been inducted into the cabinet.
Large cities, like Kanpur, Varansi, Agra, Gorakhpur, Faizabad have gone unrepresented. Two state ministers have been taken from the hills by the BJP. There are three women including Mayawati in the ministry.
There was large crowd at the time time of oath taking BSP cadres took out an impressive procession.
Their slogans were : BSP ke vasstey khali karo yer raastey (Vacate the path for the BSP) and UP ki majboori hain, Mayawati Zaroori hain.
But there were no supporters of the BJP, nor was there a procession. Only the leaders and activists were present.
