'One Uttar Pradesh minister and 3-4 BJP MLAs will resign each day till January 20', says Dharam Singh Saini

One Uttar Pradesh minister and three or four Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLAs will resign each day till January 20, Dharam Singh Saini told news agency ANI on Thursday.

OBC leader Dharam Singh Saini today became the third minister to quit the Uttar Pradesh cabinet ahead of the upcoming state assembly elections.

Saini, who was the Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Ayush, appeared headed to the Akhilesh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party. Yadav posted on Twitter a picture of himself with Saini, as he had done after OBC leaders Swami Prasad Maurya and Dara Singh Chauhan resigned from the Yogi Adityanath cabinet on Tuesday and Wednesday, respectively.

Eight BJP MLAs, including three ministers, have resigned over the past three days.

"I have resigned because for 5 years Dalits, backward classes were suppressed, their voices were suppressed... We will do whatever Swami Prasad Maurya will say. One minister and 3-4 MLAs will resign every day till Jan 20," said Saini.

In his resignation letter addressed to Governor Anandiben Patel, Saini said he was quitting over the continued neglect of the aspirations of Dalits, backwards, farmers, educated unemployed, and small and mid-level traders who together gave the BJP a sweeping majority in the 2017 Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections.

He claimed the representatives of Dalits and backwards were also being neglected.

Both Maurya and Chauhan had also levelled similar allegations in their resignation letters.

(With PTI inputs)

Published on: Thursday, January 13, 2022, 05:36 PM IST