In the second reshuffle in 48 hours, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati on Thursday rewarded three more Congress rebels by inducting them in her council of ministers, and elevated one of her own partymen to the cabinet rank.
Rajpal Tyagi, Vinod Kumar Yadav and Dinesh Singh, who had joined the BSP on Tuesday, were made ministers of state with independent charge, while Minister of State for Cultural Affairs Ramesh Kumar Sharma was elevated to the Cabinet rank.
However, Akhilesh Singh, the MLA from Rae Bareli, has not found favour with the chief minister.
"Akhilesh Singh is yet to conform to the norms of the Bahujan Samaj Party," Mayawati explained after the brief swearing-in ceremony on Thursday evening.
Sources, however, attributed Singh's exclusion to his criminal background that had forced the state administration to slap the National Security Act (NSA) on him.
"His induction would promptly invite criticism about Mayawati maintaining double standards at a time when she is going all out to nail Raghuraj Pratap Singh alias Raja Bhaiya, the independent MLA from Munda, for various criminal offences," the sources said.
In a blatant invitation to MLAs of rival parties, Mayawati said her doors would remain open to all those who wanted to join her party.
"Quite a few of the remaining 16 Congress MLA are keen on switching over to our party," she said.
"While my coalition government -- comprising the BSP, BJP and smaller parties -- was already enjoying a sound majority in the House, the addition of seven MLAs in the BSP had further reinforced its position," she said.
About the resentment among her MLAs to being dropped from the ministry, she said, "I have got the resignations of all BSP ministers who had made it absolutely clear that they are willing sacrifice their positions in the larger interest of strengthening the party."
With this, the BSP's strength had gone up to 106 in the 403-member state assembly, BJP's is 87 and the other key ally Rashtriya Lok Dal has 14 MLAs. The coalition enjoys the support of some small political parties and a few independents.
The opposition Samajwadi Party has 142 MLAs, the Congress 16 and the rest is made up of small parties and independents.
