A Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national general secretary since 2010, Rajya Sabha MP and Supreme Court advocate Bhupender Yadav's elevation to the Union Cabinet is seen as a reward for being a dependable organisation man.
A hardcore organisation man who successfully led the party in Bihar and Gujarat to impressive electoral victories in 2017 and 2020, respectively, Yadav has been appointed as the Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change along with Labour and Employment.
Born in 1969, Yadav has been representing Rajasthan in the Rajya Sabha since 2012, but party work keeps taking him to Bihar and Gujarat, the two states under his charge. The BJP is also said to be grooming Yadav as the next face of the community, which has a sizeable presence in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.
According to a PTI report, the 51-year-old has long been the go-to person for the BJP top brass in handling organisation matters and enjoys the image of a non-controversial politician, an uncommon trail which has acquitted him well with the party president JP Nadda and Union Home Minister Amit Shah.
BJP's Committee Man
Dubbed as the 'committee man' and directing the party’s views in a number of parliamentary committees. According to the NDTV report, Yadav at one point chaired eight select committees and successfully united all parties on many contentious bills.
These bills included the GST Bill, Mines and Minerals Bill and Enemy Property Bill. He also chaired of the Joint Committee on Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2015.
Yadav on COVID Pandemic and Vaccine Drive
On the Centre’s vaccination drive, Yadav has praised PM Modi’s 'stellar leadership', adding that the opposition party who are criticising the drive 'were cleaning the mirror while the dirt was on their face', reported PTI on 10 June.
"This entire fiasco of the opposition amid this pandemic reminds me of a few lines... Woh umar bhar yahi karta raha, dhool chehere pe thi aur aiyna saaf karta raha (They continued to commit this mistake the whole life, they cleaned the mirror while the dirt was on their face)," Yadav told PTI.
Mr Yadav asserted that the centre's decisions to tackle the pandemic were taken after consulting scientists, virologists, subject experts and other stakeholders.
Yadav on Anti-CAA
Yadav has demanded an independent inquiry into the anti-CAA protests, the ensuing violence in the country and the riots that erupted in north-east Delhi in February 2020.
"This country should be proud of the fact that India is giving citizenship to the religiously persecuted which is part of the human rights declaration. But this truth was projected as anti-constitutional and a poisonous atmosphere was sought to be created,” he stated in 2020.
Yadav also raised objection to the new interpretation of secularism, and said that India accommodates all including atheists. The senior BJP leader said that India doesn't need lessons on secularism from the 'so-called liberals'.
(With inputs from PTI)
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