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Ravi Shankar Prasad
Union Minister for Law & Justice, Communications, and electronics & IT
Ravi Shankar Prasad
Ravi Shankar Prasad, a member of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), holds three key positions in the Union government led by Narendra Modi in his second term in office — law & justice, communications, and electronics & information technology. In the previous stint of the government, he had held the same ministries.
Previously a Rajya Sabha member, Prasad contested the 2019 Lok Sabha elections from the high-profile seat of Patna Sahib in Bihar against former BJP member and incumbent Shatrughan Sinha, who contested on a Congress ticket this time. Prasad won the seat comprehensively, defeating Sinha by a margin of 284657 votes. Prasad polled 61.85 per cent of the votes cast in the constituency, Sinha received 32.87 per cent votes.
Previously a Rajya Sabha member, Prasad contested the 2019 Lok Sabha elections from the high-profile seat of Patna Sahib in Bihar against former BJP member and incumbent Shatrughan Sinha, who contested on a Congress ticket this time. Prasad won the seat comprehensively, defeating Sinha by a margin of 284657 votes. Prasad polled 61.85 per cent of the votes cast in the constituency, Sinha received 32.87 per cent votes.
Prasad joined the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, the students’ wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh, in 1969. He went underground when Indira Gandhi declared an Emergency in 1975. A long time Bharatiya Janata Party politician, Prasad is presently a Member of Parliament in the Rajya Sabha from Bihar since April 3, 2012. He was elected to Rajya Sabha for the first time in April 2002. When the infamous Fodder Scam came into limelight in Bihar, he filed a Public Interest Litigation in Patna High Court and demanded a probe by the Central Bureau Investigation (CBI). He defended Lal Krishna Advani in court when the latter was arrested in Bihar during his Rath Yatra in 1990. Prasad became a Member of the BJP's National Executive Committee in 1995. He was a member of the Joint Parliamentary Committee set up in 2011 to examine matters relating to allocation and pricing of telecom licences and spectrum.
Prasad has been one of the government's spokespersons on various issues, including the alleged irregularities in the Rafale fighter jet deal signed between India and France, combating fake news, misuse of social media, especially for manipulating elections, and the reliability and security of electronic voting machines, among other things
Ravi Shankar Prasad was a member of the committee tasked with preparing BJP's manifesto for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. The present government's flagship programme of Digital India, which aims to bring about good governance by using information technology, is also being implemented under his leadership.
Ravi Shankar Prasad will contest the Lok Sabha elections from Patna Sahib constituency on a BJP ticket.
OTHER KEY MINISTERS
Ravi Shankar Prasad In News
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Centre announces Rs 15,000 crore PLI for pharma, IT hardware sectors
Pharma scheme aims at Rs 3 trillion incremental sales, 100,000 jobs; experts say hardware scheme to help India become electronics ...| February 24, 2021, Wednesday -
PLI scheme for IT products has outlay of over Rs 7,000 cr, says govt
Cabinet clears Production Linked Incentive scheme to boost manufacturing of laptops, tablets, PCs, servers, says Union Minister ...| February 24, 2021, Wednesday -
Cabinet approves over Rs 12,000-cr PLI scheme for telecom sector: Prasad
The government expects that the scheme will lead to Rs 2.4 trillion incremental production of telecom equipment in the country in ...| February 17, 2021, Wednesday -
SC notice to govt, Twitter to check fake news, hate speech on platform
Notice comes amid govt-Twitter spat over content takedown requests made by Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology to ...| February 12, 2021, Friday -
Amid row with Twitter, Prasad says social media firms must abide by our law
In Rajya Sabha, minister says Twitter's double standards will not work| February 12, 2021, Friday -
'Follow our laws': Prasad tells social media firms amid row with Twitter
'Please don't spread enmity, violence and misinformation," says minister in Parliament.| February 11, 2021, Thursday -
Indian ministers switch to local platform Koo as Twitter standoff continues
Koo was launched in July 2020, founded by Aprameya Radhakrishna and Mayank Bidawatka. Radhakrishna had earlier founded ...| February 09, 2021, Tuesday -
Budget should be seen as extension of Atmanirbhar, RBI's package: Prasad
"Companies like Apple under Production Linked Incentive of Rs 1,97,000 crores will be able to manufacture mobiles. This will ...| February 02, 2021, Tuesday -
5G core network should be Indian; permission for trials soon: Prasad
Prasad said the country should move faster on the next-generation technology with indigenously made telecom gears| January 28, 2021, Thursday -
Govt looking into WhatsApp privacy policy changes: Ravi Shankar Prasad
There has been a user backlash over a new privacy policy of WhatsApp| January 19, 2021, Tuesday