Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati on Sunday named her nephew, Akash Anand, as her political heir.

Anand will oversee the Bahujan Samaj Party in states except for Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand. Mayawati will continue to monitor these two states.

The announcement comes as Mayawati chaired a meeting of the party workers on Sunday at the party’s state office in Lucknow. According to an official statement on Saturday, the party said it would analyse its performance in the recently concluded assembly polls in three states, including Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh.

Who is Akash Anand?

• Akash is the son of Mayawati’s brother Anand Kumar.
• In 2017, she introduced Akash to the senior party functionaries as an MBA graduate from London and told them that he would also be involved in party affairs.
• In the 2019 Lok Sabha election, he managed the election campaign strategy of the BSP chief while in the 2022 Uttar Pradesh assembly election, he handled the social media of the party during the campaign.
• Akash was made national coordinator of the BSP in 2019 when Mayawati rejigged the party organisation after breaking its alliance with the Samajwadi Party.
• In 2022, Anand’s name figured at the second place in the list of BSP’s star campaigners for the Himachal Pradesh assembly election. He was also entrusted with the task of gearing up the party cadre for the coming assembly elections in different states.