Former Uttar Pradesh ministers Swami Prasad Maurya and Dharam Singh Saini - who resigned this week from the Yogi Adityanath government and the ruling BJP just weeks before Assembly polls - today joined the Samajwadi Party in the presence of opposition leader Akhilesh Yadav, reports NDTV.com.

Dara Singh Chauhan is the other OBC minister in the Uttar Pradesh cabinet to have resigned too.

Also joining the Samajwadi Party were MLAs Vinay Shakya and Bhagwati Sagar.

Saini met Samajwadi party chief Akhilesh Yadav, accusing the Yogi Adityanath government of neglecting the backward classes and the Scheduled Caste communities and threatening elected representatives who spoke up for them.

Dharam Singh Saini resigned as minister of state for Ayush (independent charge), following in the footsteps of fellow OBC ministers Swami Prasad Maurya and Dara Singh Chauhan. Saini, a four-time MLA from Nakud in Saharanpur district in western Uttar Pradesh, is considered close to Maurya.

Two MLAs — Mukesh Verma and Bala Prasad Awasthi — quit the BJP. Nine MLAs, including the three ministers, have rebelled against the party over the past three days and appeared bound for the Samajwadi Party, the principal challenger to the BJP in the February-March elections.

Saini, who turned out to be the third minister that also from the OBC community to resign from gthe Uttar Pradesh cabinet had said on Thursday that the desertion was planned 1.5 years ago.

Speaking to NDTV, he said, "It was decided 1.5 years ago that we all will resign. When almost 140 MLAs had launched a dharna against the government because of how the downtrodden were being treated. But their voice was suppressed. That was when everyone decided, we will give an answer to this. We were waiting for the right moment. And that is why one minister is resigning every day. This will go on till the 20th," he said..

Meanwhile, Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav on Friday took a swipe at Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, saying by the "80 versus 20" assertion, he meant the BJP will get 20 per cent of seats in the Uttar Pradesh elections while the rest 80 per cent will go to his party.

But after the arrival of Swami Prasad Maurya and others in the SP, the saffron party would lose even this 20 per cent, Yadav said in his speech after giving party membership to Maurya and others here.

"Baba mukhya mantri (Adityanath) should engage a math teacher," the SP president said, referring to the chief minister's "80 vs 20" remarks.

Adityanath had recently said that in the Uttar Pradesh elections, while 80 per cent supporters will be on one side, 20 per cent will be on the other, which many thought was alluding to the 20 per cent Muslim population in the state.

Yadav also pooh-poohed the BJP's claim of winning three-fourth seats in the 403-member Uttar Pradesh Assembly, saying, "they meant they will win three or four seats.