Actor-turned-politician Raj Babbar was on Tuesday appointed as president of Uttar Pradesh Congress ahead of next year’s assembly polls in the state. Four senior vice-presidents, including Imran Masood, who had courted controversy a few years ago with his hate speech against BJP’s prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi in 2014, were also appointed.
The announcement was made by party general secretaries Ghulam Nabi Azad and Janardan Dwivedi at a press conference at the AICC headquarters here. Babbar (64), born in Tundla near Agra in UP, belongs to the Viswabrahmin community which is considered an OBC. He has been a three-time Lok Sabha member and is currently a Rajya Sabha member from Uttarakhand. He was a Rajya Sabha member earlier also.
“Congress President Sonia Gandhi has appointed Raj Babbar as new president of Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee, along with four senior vice presidents,” Dwivedi said. The new senior vice pressidents are Rajaram Pal, a backward, Rajesh Mishra, a Brahmin, and Bhagwati Prasad Chaudhary, a Dalit, besides Imran Masood, a minority. The outgoing UP Congress chief Nirmal Khatra has been made the chairman of the state screening committe.
Masood had courted controversy ahead of 2014 Lok Sabha polls when he said that he “will chop Modi into pieces”. Congress, which was once the dominant party in UP, had remained out of power in the state since long, losing out to the caste politics of Samajwadi Party and BSP.