Senior Congress leader Jitin Prasada on Thursday joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Delhi. he was inducted into the party by Union Minister Piyush Goyal and MP Anil Baluni. Prasada's induction into the BJP is seen as a massive gain for the party ahead of the 2022 Assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh.
Prasada, a prominent Brahmin face in UP politics, had been at odds with the Congress leadership for a long. Prasada in July last year launched the ‘Brahmin Chetna Parishad’ to give a voice to the Brahmin community. He had served in the UPA-II government. He hails from Shahjahanpur.
"If there is any political party or a leader standing for the interests of the nation today, given the situation that our country is going through, it is BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi," he said soon after joining the BJP.
"I have a three-generation connection with Congress, so I took this important decision after a lot of deliberation. In the last 8-10 years I have felt that if there is one party that is truly national, it is BJP. Other parties are regional but this is national party," Prasada added.
Prasada later met JP national president JP Nadda at latter's residence. He had also met Union Minister Amit Shah before joining the party.
was among the 'G23' leaders who have demanded an overhaul of the Congress following the drubbing in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
He is the son of senior Congress leader Jitendra Prasad. In 2001, he had started his career with IYC Indian Youth Congress as a general secretary. In 2004, he won his first Lok Sabha election from his hometown constituency of Shahjahanpur. In his first tenure, he was inducted as MoS for Steel and was one of the youngest minister in the Cabinet. In 2009, he fought and won the election from Dhaurara.
In 2014, he contested unsuccesfully against BJP's Rekha Verma. He was recently appointed as the general secretary of AICC for the party's West Bengal unit.
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