Addressing a felicitation ceremony for mid-day meal cooks and a cashless healthcare card distribution programme, Adityanath unveiled a welfare package for government primary school cooks, including a hike in honorarium, ₹2 lakh accident assistance, cashless health cover of up to ₹5 lakh and doubling the saree allowance from ₹500 to ₹1,000.
The chief minister said such measures could have been implemented earlier but were ignored because “the poor were never on the Samajwadi Party’s agenda.”
Taking a swipe at SP president Akhilesh Yadav, whom he repeatedly referred to as “Babua”, Adityanath cited Yadav’s recent remarks that the party remained united because five members of his family were MPs.
“Babua says his family members are MPs and that is why the SP is consolidated. People will wipe it out permanently in the next Assembly election,” Adityanath said.
Yadav had on Saturday said the SP’s MPs had not defected because several belonged to his family while others were Muslims and “committed socialists.”
Escalating his attack, Adityanath accused previous SP governments of promoting dynastic politics, exploiting the poor, allowing lawlessness and failing to invest in development.
Seeking to reinforce the BJP‘s welfare plank ahead of the 2027 Assembly elections, Adityanath also highlighted the transformation of government schools under Operation Kayakalp, saying institutions that were once “deserted and dilapidated” before 2017 had been upgraded against 19 prescribed infrastructure standards. His remarks came days after he indirectly challenged the CJP to film UP’s schools in response to its nationwide campaign asking people to document shortcomings in public schools.
