Mayawati is a popular Indian politician who is best known for her service of four years as being the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh. She is also the national leader of the popular political party, Bahujan Samaj Party whose main point of concern revolves around the well being of the lowest strata of the society, the Dalits and the other religious minorities.
It was in the year 1993 that Kanshi Ram collaborated with the Samajwadi Party and that was when Mayawati became the youngest Chief Minister in office for the state of Uttar Pradesh. She was also the very first woman Dalit chief minister of the state. Her tenure has been both rewarding and controversial. She is been referred to “Behenji” by her supporters.
Early life and education
Mayawati was born as Mayawati Prabhu Das on January 15, 1956 in New Delhi, India at the Shrimati Sucheta Kriplani Hospital in a Dalit family. Prabhu Das, her father was an employee at the post office at Badalpur which is located in the Gautam Buddha Nagar. She had to face discrimination right from her childhood when she went to the government school while her brother was sent to private schools.
After finishing her schooling, Mayawati pursued her Bachelor degree from Kalindi College in the year 1985 and later completed her LLB from the Campus Law Centre. She also obtained her B.Ed in the year 1986 from the VMLG College which is located in Ghaziabad. Mayawati chose to be unmarried.
Career
The political party, Bahujan Samaj Party was formed by Kanshi Ram in the year 1984 and they elected Mayawati as their representative for the seat of Kairana in their very first election campaign. She was also later elected for the years 1985 and 1987 for the seats in Bijnor and Haridwar. She finally won the seat of Bijnor in the year 1989 by 8,879 votes.
She was later elected in the Rajya Sabha of Uttar Pradesh in the year 1994. She was also elected as the head of the party in 1995 and later became the Chief Minister of the state. She also won the Lok Sabha election and served for the province of Harora and later became the Chief Minister in 1997 and later from 2002 till 2003.
Mayawati was elected as the Chief Minister for the fourth time on May 13, 2007. Her main focus during this tenure included generation of employment for the lower strata of the society instead of giving away money. She even reserved 30% of the seats in the private jobs for the Dalits but the bill was not passed by the Supreme Court of India.
Published books
A number of books have been written on Mayawati including her autobiographies which are inspirational. One of the very first reports and published books was that of the one written by journalist Mohammad Jamil Akhter, titled Iron Lady Kumari Mayawati. Her autobiographies have been published in two languages, two volumes in English and two in Hindi.
Mayawati – Net worth
Mayawati has an estimated net worth of Rs. 111 crore.
House
It has also been reported that she has two residential properties, one worth Rs. 62 crore in Delhi and Rs. 19 crore in Lucknow.