Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav said his party was willing to readmit Naresh Agarwal in the party. He, however, put a rider saying Naresh Agarwal would have to make a public statement that he was being humiliated by the Bharatiya Janata Party.

“Naresh Agarwal is known as a brilliant weather scientist; his radar had failed in 2018 and he took a wrong decision and joined the BJP,” said Akhilesh Yadav, who was in Hardoi, the hometown of Naresh Agarwal, on Wednesday to attend the 13th day rites to mourn the death of the father of SP MLA Rajpal Kashyap.

Nitin Agarwal, son of Naresh Agarwal, was elected as Samajwadi Party MLA in 2017, later he defected to the BJP after his father joined the BJP on being denied Rajya Sabha nomination by the Samajwadi Party in 2018.

Naresh Agarwal, known as a party hopper, was elected to the assembly from Hardoi as Congress candidate in 1996. In 1998 he split the Congress and formed a splinter group, Loktantrik Congress Party and supported the Kalyan Singh led BJP government and was inducted as energy minister in his cabinet. Later in 2001, he fell out with the then chief minister Rajnath Singh and was dismissed from the cabinet.

Ahead of 2002 UP assembly elections he joined the Samajwadi party and was elected to state assembly. In 2012 he was nominated to Rajya Sabha by the Samajwadi Party. He however quit the SP in 2018 on being denied the party ticket for the Rajya Sabha and joined the BJP along with his son.

The BJP had promised to accommodate Naresh Agarwal and nominate him to Rajya Sabha. The promise is yet to materialise and he is still waiting.