Kaushal Kishore, a Bharatiya Janata Party MP from Mohanlalganj in Uttar Pradesh, who has been inducted as the Union minister in Modi’s new cabinet has spent over three decades in public life.
61, Kishore who took oath as part of the Union cabinet expansion on Wednesday is serving his second term in Lok Sabha and was the Minister of State in 2003-04.
Mr Kishore was born in 1960 in Begariya village in Lucknow.
He was recruited as the state chief of the BJP’s Schedule Caste Morcha recently.
Mr Kishore has served as a member of the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly from 2002 to 2007.
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He belongs to the Schedule Castes (Pasi) community and rose to state minister position in the Samajwadi Party’s Mulayam Singh government rein.
Mr Kishore is a prominent leader of the party and is recognised for his activism related to matters of social justice. He has been vocal about the poor management and preparations of the UP government during handling the second wave of the Covid-19 crisis.
A day after Kishore’s elder brother died of Covid in April, the leader wrote a letter to Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath stating concern over the state of affairs at two government hospitals in Lucknow, King George’s Medical University and the Balrampur Hospital.
He also appealed to permit the purchase of oxygen cylinders by patients who were undergoing covid treatment in home isolation.
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The new union minister holds a Bsc degree from Kalicharan Inter College, Lucknow. He is married to Jai Devi with four sons and belongs to a family of farmers.