New Delhi: Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya made headlines at the Uttar Pradesh BJP unit’s first significant meeting on Sunday since the state’s loss of Lok Sabha seats for his outspoken remarks and apparent falling out with Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.
Around 2,000 BJP leaders and employees gathered in Lucknow for the gathering, which was supposedly organized to foster unity among the cadre and raise morale. But Maurya noted that “nobody is bigger than the organization and the party organization is bigger than the government” in his first remarks following the disastrous poll.
“Every member of the BJP is our pride. I am a BJP worker first and a deputy chief minister subsequently, and my door has always been open for anyone,” he added. It is believed that he was making a jab at Adityanath and the state bureaucracy for allegedly ignoring the concerns that BJP workers brought up in public.
The party’s total number of Lok Sabha seats won in Uttar Pradesh decreased to 33 this year from 62 in 2019.
The party’s total number of Lok Sabha seats won in Uttar Pradesh decreased to 33 this year from 62 in 2019.
During the meeting, Adityanath also stated that “prestige is there till there is power” and that “if the government faced a setback in 2027 (UP state elections), then everybody will be affected from top to bottom,” seemingly as a message to those criticizing his administration and those who worked against the party during the elections.
“The crux of the meeting was Maurya’s dig at the CM and his administration, although party president J.P. Nadda and Adityanath too tried to defuse the situation by saying that every leader is a worker and if the government is defeated, everybody will face heat in 2027,” a BJP leader who attended the meeting told ThePrint.
“The purpose of the meeting was to inspire the cadres and present a united front, but the message that has been spread is about the rift between the two leaders,” he continued.
“There was a time when people were leaving Uttar Pradesh for other states due to law and order issues,” Nadda said, praising Adityanath’s efforts in the state. Mafia rule, or mafia raj, ended today. Uttar Pradesh has made significant improvements during the past ten years. The state has the second-best economy in the nation.
“Every worker is a leader, and every leader is a worker first. Every employee is capable of overcoming obstacles,” he continued.
“There was a time when people were leaving Uttar Pradesh for other states due to law and order issues,” Nadda said, praising Adityanath’s efforts in the state. Mafia rule, or mafia raj, ended today. Uttar Pradesh has made significant improvements during the past ten years. The state has the second-best economy in the nation.
“Every worker is a leader, and every leader is a worker first. Every employee is capable of overcoming obstacles,” he continued.
The workers were also given assurances by State BJP President Bhupendra Chaudhary that the party “is a cadre-based party and protecting its workers’ respect is its priority.”
“On that, there will be no giving in. He declared, “The BJP is standing with its workers.”
As per the statement made by the BJP representative earlier, a meeting of the core committee was convened later on the subject of winning the 10 UP assembly seats that were scheduled for bye-election and refining the party organization and government apparatus. The leader told ThePrint, “The chief minister has already moved over a dozen district magistrates and police superintendents, and more will be done to ease the cadre and workers’ sentiments.”
Maurya expresses her opinion
Despite losing the state election to win the Sirathu assembly seat, Maurya was appointed deputy chief minister for the second time in 2022 and is rumored to be close to Home Minister Amit Shah.
Following rumors of his several arguments with Adityanath, he declared on social media five months after the assembly elections that the “organization is bigger than government.”
Maurya skipped one review meeting and two cabinet sessions due to the BJP’s poor showing in this year’s UP Lok Sabha elections, which raised fears of conflict between the chief minister and his deputy once more.
Maurya posted what he stated the day before on social media on Monday: “Karmaveer does not care about victory or defeat.” “My pride and honor are our workers,” and “Our organization is larger than the government…” Nobody is greater than the company!
Several BJP leaders who lost the Lok Sabha elections and have been putting pressure on the chief minister to see Maurya on Monday were the buzz of political circles at the UP BJP’s Sunday meeting. These include a Rajput politician close to the chief minister, Praveen Nishad, who also lost his Lok Sabha seat, and Sanjeev Balyan, who lost as the BJP candidate from Muzaffarnagar and claimed that former party MLA Sangeet Som was complicit in his defeat.
Along with cabinet minister Sanjay Nishad, who is reportedly seeking an assembly seat among the ten candidates running in the polls, Nishad met with Maurya, according to BJP sources.
At the gathering, Maurya also said that the workers would defeat their opponents in 2027 if they banded together and held the opposition accountable for the BJP’s defeats.
According to the chief minister, each district has a mayor, Nagar Mallika president, block president, and council member as the state is run by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Everyone would suffer if the government is damaged in 2027, thus employees and elected officials alike should start putting in the effort to return the BJP to power then.
He declared, “Every employee should swear to uphold the lotus’s victory.”
CM’s explanations for the BJP’s UP seat losses
Adityanath listed four reasons for the BJP’s dismal performance at the meeting on Sunday: overconfidence, a failure to explain the accomplishments of the “double engine” government, vote splitting as a result of the opposition’s campaign, which claimed that the BJP would amend the Constitution if given a supermajority, and a lackluster social media presence.
Our vote percentage is comparable to that of 2014, 2017, 2019, and 2022, and we triumphed greatly by encircling the opposition. However, we became overconfident that we were winning, which is why this setback happened. He declared, “The Opposition, which had previously conceded and sat down, is once more leaping and dancing today.
He said that one of the reasons we lost was that, unlike the previous Samajwadi Party administration, the BJP government had operated without prejudice. Another reason was that we had not been able to effectively convey our accomplishments.
“Dalit idols were degraded by the Samajwadi Party. Scholarships for Dalit students were discontinued, but in 2017 the BJP administration reinstated them. We were unable to popularize our accomplishments during the election,” he said, before discussing the “BJP’s incapacity to challenge the opposition on social media.”
“Opposition forces and foreigners engaged in a successful plot using these social media platforms. We are nationalists on a mission. BJP employees must monitor social media activity. The CM reportedly addressed the party organization when he stated, “We have to immediately refute the rumors.”
Devendra Pratap, a BJP MLC, wrote to Adityanath the day following the meeting, claiming that the government’s reputation was being harmed by bureaucratic corruption in the state.
Badlapur MLA Ramesh Chandra told the media on Saturday that the BJP’s circumstances were dire and that it would not be able to establish a government in Uttar Pradesh in 2027.
Prior to this, prominent BJP figure Rajendra Pratap Singh, well known as Moti Singh, claimed in a meeting that he had never observed the level of widespread corruption he was seeing in tehsils and police stations during the current administration. His comment went viral on video.
“Many MLAs who are targeting the state government are making allegations on behalf of a few leaders to corner Adityanath,” a state minister said in an interview with ThePrint. They are holding him responsible for the lackluster performance, but in reality, tickets were chosen by the Delhi High Command in defiance of local opinion.
The minister said, “A blame game has now begun to damage the CM and the motive is clear.”
In order to find out why the party was performing so poorly in the state, BJP national general secretary B.L. Santhosh had previously met with the chief minister and other party officials in Lucknow.
