Union ministers Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and RCP Singh have resigned from the Union Cabinet with their Rajya Sabha terms coming to an end on Friday.
With veteran Naqvi’s resignation, the ruling BJP will not have a Muslim face either in the central government or in parliament given the fact that two other minority leaders -- MJ Akbar and Syed Zafar Islam’s terms were over long ago. Naqvi was appointed as the minority affairs minister in Modi’s second term as Prime Minister in 2019 and Akbar came on board during a reshuffle sometime in 2016.
Steel Minister RCP Singh, who was not re-nominated to the Upper House by the Janata Dal (United), too had to quit Modi government.
Naqvi, Najma Heptulla and Shahnawaz Hussain were the only Muslim faces in the BJP since the Vajpayee-Advani era, besides the party’s founding member Sikander Bakht.
The BJP is wooing Pasmanda Muslims, with the Yogi government in Uttar Pradesh making Danish Azad Ansari a minister.