Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath meets Amit Shah; set to meet PM Modi, JP Nadda

Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath met Union home minister Amit Shah in Delhi on Thursday and is scheduled to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP president JP Nadda on Friday, days after the BJP’s national leadership visited Lucknow to take stock of the party organisation and government ahead of the 2022 assembly election.

The CM dubbed his meeting with Shah a “courtesy” and gifted the home minister a copy of ‘Covid-19 and the Migrant Crisis Resolution’, a research book prepared by the Institute for Competitiveness — the Indian affiliate of the Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness, a research and policy organisation based at Harvard Business School. The book has detailed the UP government’s handling of the migrant crisis last year, from ensuring safe return to the state to providing ration kits and employment opportunities to them.

Former Congress leader Jitin Prasada, who had joined the BJP on Wednesday, also came to meet Adityanath.

After meeting Adityanath, Shah also met Anupriya Patel, MP and founder of Apna Dal (Sonelal), the BJP’s ally in the state and at the Centre, which has been eyeing Cabinet berths both in Delhi and Lucknow.

The CM is expected to brief both the home minister and the prime minister about the state’s handling of the second wave of Covid-19 and its preparedness for a probable third wave that is expected to take place closer to the elections.

The state reported 12,243 active cases on Thursday, down from the peak of 310,000 on April 30, after a difficult phase when resources fell short amid a massive surge in infections. This led to widespread distress that also saw the BJP’s own MLAs and MPs openly calling out the government's handling of the pandemic, causing further embarrassment to the government as well as the party.

Coming on the heels of visits by the BJP’s national leaders BL Santhosh and Radha Mohan Singh last week to Lucknow, where the two had held rigorous talks with ministers and senior party leaders, Adityanath’s discussions in Delhi during his two-day tour are also likely to include the “feedback” given by the national general secretary Santhosh and UP in-charge Singh to the high command over the UP situation.