Telangana's saffron firebrand makes it as Union minister

Bandi Sanjay Kumar, who took oath as minister in the Narendra Modi cabinet on Sunday, weathered political storms and intra-party bickering before he could successfully establish himself as a firebrand BJP leader in Telangana.

The foundation for the political rise of Kumar could be traced to his days of student politics in the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, the students wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, with which he was associated since his childhood.

With his grooming in the right wing outfits providing him a clear ideological launchpad and direction, he gradually became popular as an aggressive saffron leader. Kumar's 'take the bull by the horns' style, ensured victory in a considerable  number of seats in the Hyderabad civic polls during the previous BRS regime, which gave a clear signal that the saffron party can be an alternative to the then ruling party.

Now, the BJP national general secretary, Kumar retained the Karimnagar Lok Sabha constituency in Telangana with a massive margin of over 2.25 lakh votes in the recently concluded Lok Sabha polls.

Born in 1971, Kumar contested as a BJP candidate in 2014 Karimnagar assembly elections, securing the second position with 52,000 votes.

After six months he, however, won the Karimnagar seat in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls with a majority of 96,009 votes. In 2020, he was appointed BJP president of Telangana. During his tenure as state BJP chief, Sanjay was instrumental in organising several programmes against the then K Chandrashekar Rao-led BRS government's policies, and police registered several cases against him.

Quarrels within the party led to his replacement as Telangana BJP chief and his party colleague G Kishan Reddy became the state BJP president and later he was elevated as the party's national general secretary.

Sanjay has a bachelor's degree and his wife Bandi Aparna is an employee of the State Bank of India.