Amid the big changes that Prime Minister Narendra Modi made in his Council of Ministers, the political messaging with regard to poll-bound States got obscured somewhat, but the massive reshuffle exercise will have, the BJP hopes, a positive impact in the States of Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat and Karnataka.
Caste arithmeticThe induction of three Ministers from Uttar Pradesh on Tuesday, Anupriya Patel of the Apna Dal, Mahendranath Pandey who is BJP MP from Chandauli and Mrs. Krishna Raj from Shahjahanpur conforms to the pattern of the social coalition the party wants to target in the State — namely the Kurmi (non Yadav OBC), Brahmin and Dalit respectively.
More importantly it also focuses attention on the fact that nearly six Ministers (including Prime Minister Modi) out of a total of 15 from the State, represent Eastern Uttar Pradesh or are from a radius of 100 km or less.
