Anupriya Patel returns to PM Modi's Council of Ministers for third time
Jun 09, 2024
New Delhi [India], June 9 : Apna Dal (Soneylal) leader Anupriya Patel, an alliance partner of the Bharatiya Janata Party (NDA) in the National Democratic Alliance, was on Sunday evening sworn in as one of the Union Council of Ministers in the new Narendra Modi-led government.
Patel was the Union Minister of State in the Ministry of Commerce and Industry in the Modi government from July 2021. Patel also held the charge of Union Minister of State in the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare from July 2016 to May 2019.
She was appointed as a Member of the Indian Council of World Affairs, Committee on Petitions, Standing Committee on Energy, Railway Convention Committee, Committee on Welfare of Other Backward Classes, among others in the two terms of Narendra Modi government.
During the 2024 general elections, the 43-year-old leader had won the Mirzapur Lok Sabha constituency defeating Samajwadi Party candidate Ramesh Chand Bind with a margin of 37810 votes.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Patel won the Mirzapur constituency by a margin of 2,32,008 votes against Samajwadi Party's Ramcharitra Nishad. Her party won another seat in Robertsganj, where Pakauri Lal defeated Samajwadi Party's Bhai Lal.
Daughter of Soney Lal Patel, founder of the Apna Dal party, Anupriya Patel held the post of the party president since 2016.
The family feud in the Patel household got national attention ever since Anupriya Patel was removed from her post of national general secretary in October 2014.
In 2015, Anupriya Patel's mother Krishna Patel who leads the rival faction, Apna Dal (Kamerawadi) party, suspended Anupriya for six years from the united Apna Dal party and stripped her of all posts.
The next year, Anupriya Patel joined the Narendra Modi government as a Minister of State. While the Apna Dal (Soneylal) is a BJP ally and part of the NDA bloc, the rival Kamerawadi faction has supported the INDIA bloc.
The BJP got 240 seats and NDA has secured 292 seats out of 543 Lok Sabha seats.
