There are 1,500 political parties in the country, both national and regional, but the BJP is the only party where a person from an ordinary background can rise to become the Prime Minister of the country, national party president J.P. Nadda said on Friday.
Addressing a district booth-level meeting on his visit to the Uttar Pradesh capital, Mr. Nadda accused all other parties of promoting dynasty. “All parties are in the grip of parivarvad (dynasticism). No party is spared. The father will hand over the baton to the son,” Mr. Nadda said.
The BJP is the only party, he said, where a person from an ordinary family can become the Prime Minister, Defence Minister, Home Minister or President of India. Or the Chief Minister of U.P., he said in a reference to CM Yogi Adityanath.
Mr. Nadda’s visit to Lucknow assumes significance as it comes at a time when speculation is rife about a possible portfolio allocation to Arvind Kumar Sharma, an IAS officer who worked closely with PM Narendra Modi in Gujarat and Delhi for two decades and was recently elected an MLC in the U.P. government.
A 1988 batch IAS officer of the Gujarat cadre, Mr. Sharma has closely worked with Mr. Modi, both in the Chief Minister’s Office (Gujarat) and Prime Minister’s Office in Delhi for almost two decades. He joined the BJP last week.
Mr. Sharma held the post of Secretary in the Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME), when he took voluntary retirement from service ahead of his scheduled superannuation in July 2022.
