Former bureaucrat AK Sharma, known to be among Prime Minister Narendra Modi's close aides, has been made the BJP's vice president in Uttar Pradesh, where assembly elections will be held next year. For weeks, there had been speculation that Mr Sharma, a member of the legislative council in Uttar Pradesh and a former Indian Administrative Service officer, would be made a minister in UP. He was sent to PM Modi's Lok Sabha constituency Varanasi earlier this year to oversee the fight against COVID-19.
