Years later, Prasad was the lead lawyer in the Public Interest Litigation against the former Bihar chief minister in the fodder scam case
Ravi Shankar Prasad
He spearheaded programmes for setting up BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) units in smaller towns and cities, and steered the growth of Common Service Centres (CSCs) -- government's rural outreach network for delivery of digital services as well as the new electronics policy that aims to create a USD 400 billion electronic manufacturing ecosystem by 2025, and a separate policy for software to position India as a hub for product development. An ardent social media user with over 3.2 million followers on Twitter did not stop him from taking a firm stand against social media giants like Facebook and WhatsApp on issues of fake news, data privacy, and election integrity, and has led the charge on draft data protection legislation and tightening of social media rules. Born to Thakur Prasad, a late Bihar minister and one of the tallest Jana Sangh leaders in the state, Prasad was associated with the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, the RSS' students wing since 1970s when he was a student at the Patna University from where he did his M.A. and L.L.B. Prasad became a member of the BJP national executive in 1995 and was elected to the Rajya Sabha five years later.
The then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee appointed him the Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting with independent charge. His tenure is remembered for the introduction of the Conditional Access System of satellite TV channels which is said to have dealt a body blow to unhealthy trade practices of cable TV operators. In the decade during which the BJP-led NDA remained out of power and the country was ruled by Congress-headed UPA, Prasad remained one of the most forceful spokespersons for his party. He represented 'Ram Lalla', one of the three petitioners in the Ayodhya title suit which was decided in September 2010 by the Allahabad High Court which ordered that the disputed site be equally distributed among the claimants the others being the Nirmohi Akhara and the Sunni Waqf Board. After Narendra Modi's ascension to power in 2014, Prasad was made a cabinet minister with important portfolios like Law and Justice and Electronics and IT. His tenure was marked by initiatives like a successful auction of telecom spectrum the allocation of which was mired in corruption scandals under the previous UPA dispensation, scrapping of over 100 obsolete laws, and the judicial crackdown on instant triple talaq notwithstanding reservations voiced by the opposition as well as BJP allies. Under his watch, efforts were made to streamline judicial work through measures like installation of video conferencing facilities at courts and appointment of NyayMitras for faster disposal of pending cases. He was serving his fourth consecutive term in the Rajya Sabha, to which he was re-elected only last year, before making a surprise Lok Sabha debut in the recent general elections.
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