Madhya Pradesh BJP Minister Vijay Shah may find his latest controversy the hardest to dodge

As the controversy over his recent remarks on Colonel Sofiya Qureshi spiralled manifold on Wednesday (May 14, 2025), Madhya Pradesh Cabinet Minister Vijay Shah issued an apology late in the day, saying that he respected the Indian Army officer “more than his real sister”.

“In the recent speech, my wish and intention was to put her [Col. Qureshi’s] point across in a proper manner to the society, but due to my sad and disturbed mind, some wrong words came out, due to which today I am ashamed of myself and I apologize to the entire society and the community,” he said in a video posted on social media platform X. 

Mr. Shah, the Madhya Pradesh Minister for Tribal Affairs, Asset Management, and Bhopal Gas Tragedy Relief and Rehabilitation, apologised after a long day of political backlash from across the nation, demands for his dismissal from Opposition leaders as well as from leaders of his own party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), including former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Uma Bharti, under whose tenure Mr. Shah was first made a Minister. 

The biggest setback for Mr. Shah came from the Madhya Pradesh High Court, which set a four-hour deadline for the police to register a First Information Report against him under specific Sections, resulting in a case being lodged late in the night at the Manpur police station in Indore district, where he had made the alleged inflammatory remarks on May 12. 

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While Mr. Shah has held onto his Cabinet berth for now as he has also challenged the High Court’s order in the Supreme Court, this is not the first time that he has had to lose a ministerial position over his statements. 

Months before the 2013 Assembly election, Mr. Shah’s allegedly sexist remarks against the then Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan’s wife Sadhna Singh had caused an uproar in the State, leading to Mr. Shah’s resignation within days of being pulled up by the BJP leadership of the time.

However, he managed to retain his candidature from Khandwa’s Harsud (Schedule Tribe or ST) constituency in the elections held in November 2013, and was also inducted into the new Cabinet with the School Education Portfolio. A senior BJP leader recalls that Mr. Shah evaded formal disciplinary action at the time. 

Elected for the first time in 1990, Mr. Shah has retained the Harsud seat for the consecutive eighth term, establishing himself as a prominent tribal face of the BJP in the State’s Nimar region. 

First appointed a Minister in 2003, Mr. Shah has gone on to serve under all BJP CMs since Ms. Bharti, including Babulal Gaur, Mr. Chouhan, and the sitting Chief Minister Mohan Yadav, and has held crucial portfolios, including Forest, Tourism, and Culture, among others. 

With tribal communities making up about 21% of the State’s population, community leaders, including Mr. Shah, have been crucial to the BJP’s outreach to the community that holds sway over several seats across the State, including the 47 ST reserved seats. 

The large Malwa-Nimar region alone consists of 66 Assembly constituencies, and is said to be crucial for the BJP’s return to power with a massive mandate in 2023. The party, which had been reduced to 27 seats in 2018, managed to bag 47 seats, with a clean sweep in Khandwa in 2023 solidifying Mr. Shah’s importance to the BJP. 

Despite his growing influence in the region and within the BJP, Mr. Shah has often found himself in the centre of controversies. 

As the School Education Minister in 2018, Mr. Shah drew flak following his remarks at a Teachers Day event, allegedly insulting to the transgender community. “If you don’t clap for your teachers, you’ll have to clap your hands visiting households,” he had said. 

His tenure as the School Education Minister was also marked by multiple other rows, including a directive making it mandatory for school students to answer the roll call with ‘Jai Hind’. 

In 2022, Mr. Shah made headlines with his personal remarks against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, now the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, saying that his son had married at the age 25 while Mr. Gandhi was still unmarried. 

“If a boy turns 50-55 and doesn’t get married, people ask if there is any shortcoming,” he had said, without naming the Congress leader. 

Mr. Shah had courted another political row the same year with his remarks on former Prime Ministers. “75 years have passed since the Independence, but [PM Narendra] Modi is the first leader who is improving the lives of the poor. Before him, all Prime Ministers were ghoda [horse], gadha [donkey] and haathi [elephant] chhaap. None of them cared for the poor,” he had said.

While his previous controversies did not cause much harm to his standing in the party and the government, Madhya Pradesh BJP leaders believe the current issue “has escalated beyond the State leadership”.

“He has been in limelight for his statements throughout his career, but this time he has touched a very sensitive subject. The State leadership’s opinion does not matter much here as they will have to act as per Delhi’s directions,” a party insider said, requesting anonymity. 

“His consecutive electoral success and influence in his region have helped him over the years. The party has also groomed him as a tribal leader in the region. But what happens now will solely depend on how the national leadership decides,” the leader noted. 

Whether he is able to keep his ministerial berth or not will be clear in coming days, but for now, Mr. Shah struggles to find a single voice in his defence. 

Madhya Pradesh BJP chief V. D. Sharma has said that the party has issued him a warning, while the Chief Minister has also directed action against him following the High Court’s order.