UP polls 2022: Aparna Yadav’s induction into the BJP comes almost a week after more than a dozen MLAs of Uttar Pradesh’s ruling party, including three sitting ministers, joined the Samajwadi Party, which is headed by her brother-in-law Akhilesh Yadav.
Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath on Tuesday welcomed into the ‘BJP family’ Aparna Yadav, the younger daughter-in-law of Samajwadi Party (SP) patriarch and former CM Mulayam Singh Yadav, who joined the Bharatiya Janata Party earlier today, ending days of speculation over her joining the party.
“Aparna ji, welcome to the BJP family,” tweeted Adityanath in Hindi, sharing a photograph with the new joinee. Also present in the photo were BJP national president JP Nadda, UP unit chief Swatantra Dev Singh deputy chief ministers Keshav Prasad Maurya and Dinesh Sharma, Union minister Shobha Karandlaje, among others.
Swatantra Dev Singh and Keshav Prasad Maurya inducted Yadav into the party in a press conference at the BJP headquarters in New Delhi. After joining, she expressed her admiration for both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and CM Yogi Adityanath; in the past, she has publicly supported policies of the BJP-led governments at the Centre and in Uttar Pradesh.
Meanwhile, reacting to Aparna Yadav’s jump to the BJP, her brother-in-law and SP chief Akhilesh Yadav said, “First, I will congratulate her. Then I have good wishes for her. It is good that Samajwadi ideology is spreading to BJP as well I hope our ideologies reach there and save the constitution. Netaji (Mulayam Singh Yadav) counselled her against this a lot.”
The move is being seen as a ‘tit for tat’ response by the Bharatiya Janata Party to the Samajwadi Party, which last week welcomed more than a dozen MLAs from the state’s ruling dispensation, including three sitting ministers–Swami Prasad Maurya, Dharam Singh Saini and Dara Singh Chauhan.
