Pralhad Joshi was appointed the new Education Minister on Saturday, July 25, hours after Dharmendra Pradhan resigned following weeks of nationwide protests over alleged examination irregularities and the NEET paper leak.
Joshi, 63, a five-time BJP MP from Karnataka’s Dharwad constituency, will take charge of the Education Ministry while continuing to head the Ministries of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, and New and Renewable Energy. He has previously served as Union Minister for Coal, Mines and Parliamentary Affairs.
A Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) worker before joining the BJP, Joshi spent years building his political career within the party organisation rather than in the state government. He emerged as a prominent BJP leader during the Hubballi Idgah Maidan row in the early 1990s, when party and RSS workers campaigned to hoist the national flag at the disputed site.
In 2004, he entered Parliament after winning the Dharwad Lok Sabha seat, which he has retained in every election since. Alongside his parliamentary career, Joshi held several key organisational roles in the BJP, including Dharwad district president, Karnataka BJP general secretary, and state president between 2013 and 2016.
Just a day before Pradhan resigned, Joshi had defended the government’s handling of the crisis while accusing “anti-social elements” of attempting to exploit the student movement.
“The Modi government has always stood with students and the youth. It remains committed to taking strict action against any irregularities or injustices that affect their future,” Joshi had said.
He had also maintained that while students had every right to protest peacefully, “there are reports that anti-social elements are trying to hijack the movement. Students must remain cautious and ensure their genuine concerns are not exploited.”
Speaking to The News Minute, journalist and political analyst Shivasundar said Joshi’s appointment was consistent with the BJP’s long-standing approach to the Education Ministry, which he said has often been headed by leaders who seek to further the party’s and the RSS’s ideological and cultural agenda through education.
Describing Joshi as a staunch proponent of Hindi and Sanskrit, Shivasundar said the Union Minister had “on record said very venomous things” and had been “irreverent towards Karnataka’s history”.
According to Shivasundar, the decision to hand Joshi the education portfolio, even as an additional charge, reflects the BJP’s priorities. “Even though this is a temporary arrangement, choosing someone like Pralhad Joshi shows their inclination,” he said.
Shivasundar does not expect any significant change in the Union government’s response to the ongoing NEET controversy under Joshi. Instead, he said the minister is likely to continue the Union government’s current approach of portraying criticism of the National Testing Agency (NTA) and demands for structural reforms, including calls to dismantle NEET, as anti-national.
“His immediate remarks after being given this responsibility were essentially, ‘We will have an eye on you’. He has already cautioned protesters, which suggests he will pursue what they describe as weeding out so-called anti-national elements. Anything against the NTA or any federal agenda, including demands to dismantle NEET, would be treated as anti-national. For the BJP, even federalism itself is viewed as anti-national,” Shivasundar said.
In the past, Joshi has also courted controversy on multiple occasions over his public remarks. In 2022, after the premature release of 11 men serving life sentences in the Bilkis Bano gangrape case, Joshi defended the decision, saying it had been taken “as per the legal provision”. He told The Indian Express that remission was granted in accordance with the law after the convicts had completed the required period in prison.
During the 2024 Karnataka Assembly bye-poll campaign, he referred to retired Justice Michael D’Cunha, who headed the inquiry into the alleged COVID-19 scam under the previous BJP government, as a “Congress agent”. The comment drew sharp criticism from the Congress government, with Health Minister Dinesh Gundu Rao suggesting that Joshi could face legal action. Joshi later wrote to D’Cunha expressing regret and said that he had not intended to question the former judge’s integrity, but only the state government’s handling of the inquiry report.
During the controversy over revisions to Karnataka’s SSLC textbooks, Joshi dismissed allegations that the BJP government was saffronising the curriculum. He argued that the criticism stemmed from ideological opposition to the BJP and described the row as politically motivated ahead of elections.
In 2008, Gauri Lankesh published an article in her tabloid accusing local BJP figures in Dharwad, including Pralhad Joshi and his secretary Umesh Dushi, of cheating a jeweller and threatening him. Joshi and Dushi sued her for defamation, and Gauri’s lawyer reportedly couldn’t prove the claims were true. Gauri was convicted, and her appeal was still pending when she was murdered in 2017, after which the case was abated.