Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): Jagdish Devda, one of the two deputy chief ministers of Madhya Pradesh to take oath on Wednesday, is a seven-time MLA of the BJP who entered politics in his student days and held key portfolios during his long stint in the cabinet under different party-led governments.
Mohan Yadav, the BJP legislature party leader and MLA from Ujjain South, was sworn-in as chief minister of Madhya Pradesh at a grand ceremony at the Lal Parade Ground here. Devda and another deputy CM, Rajendra Shukla, were administered oath of office by Governor Mangubhai Patel.
Devda, 66, was elected from the Malhargarh (SC) seat in Mandsaur district in the November 17 assembly polls.
The prominent Dalit leader was holding the finance portfolio in the previous Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government helmed by Shivraj Singh Chouhan.
He made his political debut when he contested and won the election of president of student union of Government College at Rampura in Neemuch district in 1979.
After holding various posts in the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM) and later in the BJP, Devda, a law-degree holder, first entered the state assembly in 1990 when he got elected from Suwasara in Mandsaur district.
Devda won from the seat again in 1993 and 2003 polls. After the BJP came to power in Madhya Pradesh in 2003, ending the Congress's 10-year-rule, Devda was made a minister of state in the Uma Bharti-led government. He held various portfolios, including public health engineering, school education and home, among others.
In 2008, when the BJP retained power, he contested and won from the newly-carved seat Malhargarh (SC) post-delimitation. He joined the Shivraj Singh Chouhan cabinet.
Devda retained Malhargarh in 2013 and in the 2018 assembly polls, too. He was fielded from the reserved seat once again in the last month's assembly and emerged victorious by defeating his nearest rival, independent candidate Shyamlal Jokchand, by a margin of more than 59,000 votes.
For a brief period in 2020, Devda was the speaker of the state assembly.
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