Two days after being moved out of the Ganga Rejuvenation and Water Resources Ministry, Union Minister Uma Bharti on Tuesday dismissed reports that “Prime Minister [Narendra] Modi was unhappy with her performance”, and said she was “chided only twice for being overweight.”
Ms. Bharti, who took charge as the Minister for Drinking Water and Sanitation on Monday, announced that she would undertake a year-long Ganga Yatra from October to create awareness on keeping the river clean.
Not defiance
“There is a personal connection between the Ganga and me, and none comes in between,” Ms. Bharti said, while clarifying that she had announced the yatra a year ago and it should not be seen as an act of defiance.
Talking about her removal from the Water Resources Ministry, Ms. Bharti said, “It was claimed that I failed at my previous Ministry. Yesterday [Monday], Nitinji himself said he was associated with me on the issues of the Ganga. How come he got the portfolio if we failed? This means we did not fail on the ‘Clean Ganga’ front,” she told presspersons.
Ms. Bharti said it was under her that the river interlinking projects came out of official files and the “Ken-Betwa interlinking project was about to take off while Damanganga-Par-Tapi-Narmada was in the pipeline.”