Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA from Agra’s Fatehabad constituency, Chotelal Verma, died on Thursday at a hospital in Noida, PTI reported. He was 73.
Uttar Pradesh chief minister paid tribute to Verma in a post on X, describing his death as “extremely sad”. He prayed to Lord Shri Ram to grant salvation to the departed soul and strength to Verma’s family to bear the loss.
Verma was first elected as an MLA from the Fatehabad constituency in 1993 on a ticket at the age of 40. He contested the 1996 election on a BJP ticket but lost to Janata Dal’s Vijay Pal Singh. He returned to the assembly in 2002 after winning the seat on a BJP ticket.
He contested the 2007 election on a (SP) ticket but was unsuccessful. He later joined the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and won the Fatehabad seat in 2012. Verma subsequently returned to the BJP and won the constituency for a fourth time in 2022, securing more than 50,000 votes.
According to Live Hindustan, in 2008, Verma was appointed vice-chairman of the Ramganga Command Project, Kanpur-Lucknow, a position carrying the rank of a minister of state. In May 2009, he was appointed chairman of the Uttar Pradesh State Integration Council, a post carrying the rank of deputy minister.
Verma is survived by three sons and three daughters.
His son Mahendra Verma told Live Hindustan that after a post-mortem in Noida, Verma’s body reached Agra at around 3 am on Friday. The final viewing will take place at the family’s residence in Vibhav Nagar until around 3 pm, after which his body will be taken to his ancestral village, Nagla Devhans.
Verma was overseeing the construction of a temple in the village. His body will be kept at the temple premises for people to pay their last respects before his last rites are performed with state honours at a cremation ground on the banks of the Yamuna.
