Neera, husband join BJP

LUCKNOW: Two trusted members of SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav's coterie - former chief secretary Neera Yadav and her husband Mahendra Singh
Yadav -left him for the saffron camp on Sunday. The high-profile couple was inducted into the BJP by party president Rajnath Singh amid fanfare in Ghaziabad.

The development is being interpreted as a shrewd move by the master strategist Rajnath Singh to improve his party's poll prospects. Mahendra Singh, a former minister and MLA from neighbouring Bulandshehar, can help the vote tally with his influence among the about 50,000 Yadav voters in his constituency. Neera, a Tyagi before her marriage to the former IPS officer, can come in handy wooing the sizable Tyagis in the belt. Moreover the defiance by the Yadav couple would also deal a great blow to Mulayam's vanity much to BJP's delight.

Neera Yadav had been Mulayam's most trusted chief secretary during the SP regime in UP who was assigned the top job despite a pending CBI inquiry in the Noida plot allotment case. She was removed only at the Supreme Court's directives in October 2007. Later appointed head of vigilance establishment, Neera took voluntary retirement in March 2008 miffed by the internal politics of the IAS cadre after the association, in a skilfully executed coup, displaced her as the head of the IAS association chairperson.

Mahendra Singh Yadav had joined politics in 1996 after a golden handshake with UP police. Yadav had also been the MLA from Bulandshehar on a BJP ticket. However after his differences with Kalyan Singh he dropped out and joined the SP. Yadav had contested the assembly election under SP banner in 2007 but lost.