Ram Shankar Katheria: This Controversial Leader Is BJP's Firm Call In Etawah (image: facebook.com/DrRamshankarKatheria)
Ram Shankar Katheria is a BJP leader and a parliamentarian. In the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, he will be seeking his second term from Uttar Pradesh”s Etawah constituency. Previously, Ram Shankar Katheria represented Agra parliamentary constituency twice; 2009 and 2014. In the 2019 elections, Ram Shankar Katheria defeated Samajwadi Party candidate Kamlesh Katheria by a margin of 64,437 votes.
A native of Eatwah, Ram Shankar Katheria associated with RSS in in his youth days. He served as a RSS pracharak in Agra for 13 years. Before venturing into politics, he worked as Hindi faculty at the Agra University. He is an excellent orator and has authored several books on the subject, Dalit upliftment.
He was promoted to the post of party”s National General Secretary in 2014 and was in charge of the states, Punjab and Chhattisgarh in the same year. In the cabinet expansion, BJP MP had served as the Union Minister of State for Human Resource Development from November 2014 to July 2016. As the controversy erupted over his alleged forging of post-graduation and graduation mark-sheets to secure a teaching job at Agra University. Following the charges, Ram Shankar Katheria was dropped from the ministerial post. Besides, he faced controversy for his alleged hate speech early in 2016. However, BJP leader has strongly denied all these allegations.
Ram Shankar Katheria”s name has been associated with various cases previously as well. Earlier, Congress attacked Modi government for enlisting tainted ministers including Katheria.
In 2017, Katheria was appointed as the Chairperson of National Commission for Scheduled Castes and held the office for a period of three years.
Earlier in August last year, in relation with a 12-year-old case of assault and rioting, BJP MP was sentenced to two year” imprisonment and a fine of Rs 50,000 by a special MP/MLA court in Agra. Following his appeal, Agra district and sessions court acquitted him of all the charges in the case, and thus saved from losing his Lok Sabha membership.
