Swatantra Dev Singh

Some Lesser Known Facts About Swatantra Dev Singh

• Swatantra Dev Singh is an Indian politician who assumed the position of Minister of Jal Shakti & Disaster Management in the Government of Uttar Pradesh on 25 March 2022. On 10 August 2022, he resigned from the post of BJP chief and cabinet minister of the BJP.

• When he was in school, he had an interest in sports, and he was also the captain of his school’s wrestling team.

• He started his career as a reporter for a Hindi daily, Swatantra Bharat, in 1986.

• In 1985, he contested the student union president elections from DVC College in Orai, Mirzapur, but he lost the elections.

• In 1986, he joined RSS and started working as the pracharak of the Sangh.

• In 1989, he joined the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) and worked there as an organization minister.

• He was in charge of rallies for the BJP in Uttar Pradesh in 2014 and for BJP in West Uttar Pradesh during the 2017 Assembly polls.

• During the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, he took out rallies in Madhya Pradesh and helped the BJP win there.

• In an interview, one of Swatantra’s allies said that Swatantra was named Congress Singh by his parents, but later, he changed his name to Swatantra Dev Singh. In the interview, he added,
  

  I remember we were all sitting in the RSS office when we asked him why he is called Congress. He told us his father was a Congressi, and was worried about the future of the party so gave his son this name to ensure the party’s legacy continues. But we collectively decided that his name should be changed, and that’s how Swatantra came to be.”

• Although he was against the ideology of RSS he was in college, but later, he joined Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), the all-India student organization affiliated to the RSS.

  

• In 2021, he commented on the Samajwadi Party and stated that the party promoted family politics. In the statement, he said,
  

  Remaining away from family-based politics, the BJP has given important posts to hardworking people in the organisation and the government. Even a common worker in our party can dream of sitting at the top position. Whereas, in the SP, BSP and Congress, ordinary workers are kept away from top posts because of the importance given to families.”

• In April 2022, he inaugurated the fuel conservation mega campaign ‘Saksham-2022’ at Indira Gandhi Pratishthan.

•  In July 2022, he resigned as UP BJP chief after his junior minister Dinesh Khatik sent his resignation to  Amit Shah, citing corruption in the department and the malice behaviour of bureaucrats in the ministry toward his Dalit identity.