Mayawati is an Indian politician and former chief minister of Uttar Pradesh. She served as president of the People’s Socialist Party (BSP). She served as the 17th Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh. She is popularly known as Bahen Ji, Kumari Mayawati and the Iron Lady by his followers and well-wishers. She is considered one of India’s most powerful female politicians.
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Mayawati was born on January 15, 1956 in New Delhi, India, to a Hindu Scheduled Caste family (age: 68, as of 2024). Her father, Prabhu Das, worked as a post office employee in Badalpur, Gautam Buddha Nagar, Uttar Pradesh. She completed her education from Delhi University and received her BA and LLB degrees. She received her Bachelor of Education degree from VMLG College, Ghaziabad. After completing her studies, she taught in JJ Colony, Inderpuri, Delhi and prepared for the Civil Services Examination. Author Ajay Bose writes in his book Behenji: A Political Biography of Mayawati that in 1977, Kanshi Ram, the future founder of the Bahujan Samaj Party, visited her family and told her, “I can make you so Great man”. Leader, one day, not one, but a whole row of IAS officers will be lining up waiting for your orders. “
Early photos of Mayawati
appearance
- Height: 158 cm or 5 feet 2 inches
family
Mayawati was born to Prabhu Das and Ram Rati. She has only one sibling, her brother Anand Kumar, who is also a politician.
Mayawati and her brothers
She never married and remained single throughout her life.
Profession
When Kanshi Ram founded BSP in 1984, Mayawati was in his team. In her first election campaign, she was contested for the Kairana Lok Sabha seat in Muzaffarnagar district by the Socialist Party of the Philippines. She won the 1989 general election for the first time and became Binol’s representative in the House of Commons. She defeated Janata Dal’s Mangal Ram Premi by a margin of 8,879 votes. In 1994, she was elected to the Bundestag for the first time. After joining forces with the Samajwadi Party, Mayawati became chief minister of state for the first time, but her government lasted only a short time. In the 1996 general election, she won two constituencies but served as Harora MP. In 1997, she became chief minister again, but her term was short-lived. As a result of the alliance with the Janata Party, she served as chief minister again from May 3, 2002 to August 29, 2003, until the Janata Party withdrew its support.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zs-0r77y60
On September 18, 2003, she was elected as the next president of BSP after Kanshi Ram. She became the state’s chief minister for the fourth time in 2007 and completed her first full term in 2012.
Mayawati and Kansi Ram
dispute
- In 2002, her name emerged in the Taj Corridor Scam, in which she and a government minister, Naseemuddin Siddiqui, were accused of corruption. The total estimated cost of the project is Rs 175 crore. Mayawati allegedly misappropriated funds from the project.
- She has been criticized for increasing her assets. In 2003, her assets were worth Rs 1 crore, but in 2007, they were worth over Rs 50 crore and in 2012, they were worth over Rs 111 crore.
- During her tenure as chief minister, she was at the center of controversy for investing huge sums of money in building parks, memorials, statues, galleries, etc. Her projects were roundly condemned by the media and other political parties for excessive spending.
Ambedkar Memorial Park, Lucknow
- Mayawati has also been criticized for mismanagement of World Bank funds.
- In 2010, she was criticized for wearing a garland worth over Rs 22 crore.
- WikiLeaks revealed that when she was the state’s chief minister, she sent an empty private plane to get a specific brand of sandals from Mumbai. This news went viral in the media and caused huge controversy.
- In March 2019, the Supreme Court asked her to clarify the money spent on the elephants and her sculptures.
- On April 15, 2019, the Election Commission suspended her for 48 hours for violating the Model Code of Conduct (MCC).
Assets/Net Worth
She has deposits of Rs 13 crore in banks, financial institutions and other companies. She owns jewelery worth over Rs 1 Crore. She owns commercial and residential buildings worth over Rs 96 crore. Her net worth is approximately Rs 111 crore.
favorite thing
fact
- Former Indian Prime Minister PV Narasimha Rao called her political career a “miracle of democracy.”
- She is India’s first female Scheduled Caste Chief Minister.
- Her supporters celebrated her birthday in the name of ‘Jan Kalyankari Diwas’.
- In 2007-2008, Mayawati paid an income tax of 26.26 billion rupees, ranking 20th in the list of the top 200 taxpayers at that time.
- At one point, she lashed out at the BJP and RSS, saying that if they (BJP and RSS) did not change their attitude towards the backward classes, she and millions of her supporters would convert to Buddhism.
- Time magazine named Mayawati one of India’s 15 most influential people in 2007.
- In 2008, Forbes ranked her at number 59 on its list of the 100 most powerful women in the world.
- In 2009, the American magazine Newsweek described her as India’s Barack Obama.
- Her hobbies are reading and writing.
- On December 10, 2023, Mayawati announced her nephew Akash Anand as her successor. On May 8, 2024, Anand was relieved of his duties as Mayawati’s political heir apparent and the party’s national coordinator after Mayawati announced that he would need more maturity to hold these positions.
Akash Anand standing next to Mayawati and Akhilesh Yadav
- In a bid to defeat the BJP and the Congress in the 2019 general elections, the Mayawati-led BJP joined the Mahagathbandhan (or grand alliance). Other political parties in the Mahagathbandhan include Samajwadi Party (SP), Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD), Lok Insaaf Party, Punjabi Ekta Party and others.
Mayawati shared the stage with Mulayam Singh Yadav and Akhilesh Yadav
- She also wrote her autobiography Mere Sangarshmai Jeevan Evam Bahujan Movement Ka Safarnama.
Mayawati and her autobiography
Categories: Biography
Source: HIS Education