Former Uttar Pradesh minister and BJP MLA Dal Bahadur Kori on Friday succumbed to Covid-19 at a private hospital in Lucknow where he was admitted almost a week ago. The 64-year-old became a legislator from Salon assembly seat in Raebareli for the first time in 1996, and became then went on to become Minister of State (MoS) during the chief minister-ship of Rajnath Singh.
Kori had joined Congress in 2004, however, a decade later in 2014, he returned to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). In 2017, he won the Salon assembly seat on a BJP ticket. Due to his hard work in Salon, which falls under Amethi Lok Sabha, that the BJP perfomed well during the 2019 general elections, leading to the victory of Union Minister Smriti Irani.
Kori is the fourth BJP MLA to have lost the battle to Covid-19 in the past fortnight.
A few days ago, BJP MLA from Nawabganj constituency in Bareilly, Kesar Singh Gangwar had died of Covid-19 at a hospital in Noida. Singh was initially admitted to Medical College at Bhojipura, and was discharged from there after recovery. However, his health deteriorated again, after which he was taken to the hospital again where he tested positive for Covid-19. He was given plasma therapy which too did not bring any significant improvement in his health.
Earlier on April 23, Lucknow (West) legislator Suresh Kumar Srivastava died from the infection and his wife, Malti, also passed away two days later. Both were being treated at a hospital in Lucknow. Prior to their death, Suresh Srivastava’s drive had also succumbed to the virus.
Another BJP MLA Ramesh Chandra Diwakar from Auraiya Sadar had died due to Covid-19 on April 22. Post the infection, Diwakar started to have lung problems, and was admitted to Meerut Medical College in critical condition but could not be saved.
Leaders of other political parties including the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) have also fallen prey to the deadly virus.
Uttar Pradesh has 403 posts of MLAs in the Legislative Assembly. Of these, 307 legislators belong to the BJP, 49 are from SP and 18 belong to the BSP.
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