Ramapati Shastri

Ramapati Shastri is an Indian politician and a member of the 6th, 7th, 10th, 11th, 12th, 13th, and 17th Legislative Assembly of Uttar Pradesh of India. Currently, he is serving as Cabinet Minister of Social Welfare and Minister of SC & ST Welfare in the Yogi Adityanath government. He represents the Mankapur (Assembly constituency) in Gonda district of Uttar Pradesh and is a member of the Bharatiya Janata Party. He is also elected as Protem Speaker of 18th Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly

Early life and education
Shastri was born on 15 October 1952 in Bishnoharpur village of the Gonda district to his father Ram Laut who belongs to tanbina gotra of Kori/koli caste. He married Lt. Mangla Devi, with whom he has one son and one daughter. He passed high school and intermediate examination from Gandhi Inter College, Nawabganj. In 1984, he received the degree of Shastri from Sampurnanand Sanskrit University, Varanasi.

Political career
Shastri has been MLA for seven strength terms. In 1974, his first election, he became an MLA on the Jan Sangh ticket from the Dixir reserved seat. He lost the elections to the Babulal of Congress in 1980 and 1985. In 1989, he became MLA from BJP for the third time. Fourth time after winning elections in Ramlahar in 1991, he was made a cabinet minister in Kalyan Singh's government. During this tenure, he held the Ministry of Social Welfare and Revenue Department. The fifth time he again won the election in 1993 from Diksir. In 1996, after winning for the sixth time he was again appointed Cabinet Minister for Medical Health and Family Welfare Department in the BJP government. In the 2002 election, he lost to SP's Babulal. During this time, the BJP made him the National President of the Scheduled Castes Morcha. In the 2007 election, he lost to Bahujan Samaj Party candidate Ramesh Gautam.

In 2012, the Dixir assembly seat came out of the reservation in the name of Tarabganj. This time Shastri contested from Balrampur Sadar and secured the seat, but lost. Since 2017, he has represented the Mankapur (Assembly constituency) in the Gonda district of Uttar Pradesh and is a member of the Bhartiya Janta Party. In the 2017 elections, he defeated his nearest rival Bahujan Samaj Party candidate Ramesh Chandra Gautam by a record margin of 60,161 votes.