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Actor-turned-politician Suresh Gopi on Sunday evening was sworn in as Minister of State in Prime Minister Narendra Modi''s Council of Ministers marking a historic first for the Bharatiya Janata Party which managed to breach the Kerala bastion in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Also inducted into the Prime Minister''s Council of Ministers today was BJP Kerala general secretary George Kurian. Gopi became the face of the ''Modiyude Gaurantee'' (Modi''s Guarantee) promise to Kerala as the actor became a part of the union council of ministers in the government of Prime Minister who was sworn in today for a historic third term. The 65-year-old actor won the parliamentary seat of Thrissur in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections defeating advocate and CPM candidate VS Sunilkumar by 74,686 votes. Prime Minister Narendra Modi held his first poll roadshow in Thrissur in December last year and later the Prime Minister also made another visit to the constituency to attend the wedding of Gopi''s daughter at Guruvayoor Srikrishna Temple. Suresh Gopi''s Lok Sabha win during this elections is significant for the BJP in Kerala, as the party has previously struggled to establish a strong presence in the state. The actor took oath as minister at Rashtrapati Bhavan on Sunday. Suresh Gopi is the the first BJP Lok Sabha MP from Kerala. On June 4, the day when election results emerged indicating his win, he told ANI that he was escatic. " I am in totally an ecstatic mood. What was very impossible became gloriously possible...it was not a 62-day campaign process, it was an emotional carriage for the past 7 years...I work for Kerala as a whole. My first pick will be to have AIIMS..." Meanwhile, the BJP state general secretary Kurian had previously served as the national vice president of the Yuva Morcha. In the year 2017 he became the first from Kerala to be appointed the vice-chairman of the National Minorities Commission. A lawyer by profession he was also the officer on special duty (OSD) to BJP leader O Rajagopal, during his term as Union minister in the Atal Behari Vajpayee government. In the year 2016, he contested and lost Assembly elections from Puthuppally which was considered, a Congress stronghold. (ANI)
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