After over two decades in public life, former chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, Akhilesh Yadav, visited Noida in Gautam Buddha Nagar district on Saturday. During his tenure as chief minister from March 2012 to March 2017, Akhilesh Yadav stayed away from Noida.
As chief minister, he had inaugurated the Agra-Yamuna Expressway passing through Noida in August 2012 through remote from Lucknow.
Akhilesh Yadav, a three term MP and presently MLA from Karhal in Mainpuri district and leader of opposition in UP Assembly, unveiled the statue of a local leader, Raghuveer Singh Pradhan in Noida on Saturday. He was accorded a warm welcome by the party leaders in Noida.
Addressing the meeting after unveiling the statue, Akhilesh Yadav launched a scathing attack on Yogi Adityanath government.
“The Yogi government is neck-deep in corruption. UP has never witnessed such a large-scale corruption in transfers and postings of government officials. The Chief Minister does not even know who is minister in his cabinet and the sole concern of the ministers is transfers and postings of officials,” Akhilesh Yadav alleged.
During the March 2022 UP Assembly election, Akhilesh Yadav had said that “whichever chief minister goes to Noida loses the election”. Akhilesh Yadav had also predicted that the Bharatiya Janata Party would lose the election and Yogi Adityanath would never be the chief minister for the second term.
Yogi Adityanath, in first tenure as chief minister, had visited Noida a dozen times. During the last assembly elections, Yogi Adityanath had scoffed at his predecessors for avoiding the place based on superstition. Yogi Adityanath had reiterated that Noida was important as it shared a border with Delhi, and slammed prioritising politics over people's welfare.
The last chief minister to visit Noida before Yogi Adityanath was Mayawati in 2011 and she lost the subsequent election in 2012.
The Noida jinx gained prominence in 1988 when then Chief Minister Veer Bahadur Singh had to step down from his post a few days after he visited Noida. Later subsequent chief ministers like Mayawati, Kalyan Singh too believed that their poll loss was due to their visit to Noida, giving the corporate hub the reputation of being ‘unlucky'. Since then, as chief ministers, Akhilesh Yadav, Mulayam Singh Yadav, Kalyan Singh and Rajnath Singh avoided visiting the place, preferring to unveil projects remotely.
Noida (New Okhla Industrial Development Authority) located in Gautam Buddha Nagar district is of prime importance as it shares borders with the national capital and there is frequent movement of people across the state borders.