BJP may have swept the Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls by winning 273 seats with its alliance partners but as many as eleven ministers, including deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya, in the Yogi Adityanath cabinet faced drubbing at the hustings.
Maurya, who was in the fray from the Sirathu assembly seat in Kaushambi district, was defeated by Samajwadi Party (SP) nominee Pallavi Patel, who made her electoral debut from the seat. In a close contest, Pallavi defeated Maurya, considered to be a heavyweight and an influential OBC leader, by around seven thousand votes.
Maurya's defeat assumes significance as he enjoyed the number two position in the cabinet. His differences with chief minister Yogi Adityanath had often made headlines in the media during the BJP regime.
Maurya was tipped to be the chief minister when the BJP had formed its government after the 2017 assembly elections but lost the race to Adityanath. Although Maurya was seen by the side of Adityanath when the latter had addressed the party workers at the BJP office here on Thursday evening, it was not clear if he would again be inducted in the cabinet as deputy CM.
Besides Maurya, firebrand saffron party leader and minister for cane Suresh Rana also tasted defeat from the Thana Bhavan assembly seat in Muzaffarnagar district. Rana had to face opposition from the people, especially farmers, in his constituency who were angry with him over the failure of the sugar mills to clear cane arrears.
The other UP ministers, who failed to make it to the assembly, included Suresh Dwivedi, Moti Singh, Upendra Dwivedi, Ranvendra Pratap Singh, Anand Swaroop Shukla, Chandrika Prasad Upadhyay, Sangeeta Balwant, Chatrapal Gangwar and Lakhan Singh Rajput.
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