Patna: Former Bihar chief minister and JD (U) president Nitish Kumar`s son, Nishant Kumar, was among 32 politicians from the NDA who took oath as ministers even as seven new faces were also inducted into the cabinet.
Another prominent leader who took oath as a minister is Vijay Kumar Sinha, who was deputy chief minister in the previous Nitish Kumar government.
Notably , sons of three former chief ministers – Nitish Kumar, Jitan Ram Manjhi and Jagannath Mishra – have found place in the state cabinet. While it will be the maiden entry of Nishant into the state cabinet, Manjhi`s son, Santosh Kumar Suman and Mishra`s son, Nitish Mishra, have already served as ministers. Earlier, Nishant had declined the post of deputy CM but accepted the post of a minister following a persuasion by union minister Rajiv Ranjan Singh aka Lalan Singh.
The swearing-in ceremony, held at historic Gandhi Maidan, was graced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Union Health Minister J P Nadda, Nitish Kumar, BJP national president Nitin Nabin and a number of other senior leaders. On the way to Gandhi Maidan from Patna Airport, Modi’s vehicle was showered with flower petals by people who lined up on both sides of the road.
As many as 15 leaders from BJP, 13 from JD (U), 2 from LJP (RV) and one each from HAM and RLM were sworn-in as ministers. Bihar Governor Syed Ata Hasnain administered the oath to all these ministers. On April 15, Samrat had taken oath as CM while JD (U) Vijay Kumar Chaudhary and Bijendra Prasad Yadav were sworn-in as deputy chief ministers.
With the rejig, Samrat cabinet’s strength has gone to 35. There could be a maximum of 36 ministers including CM in the 243-member Bihar assembly.
Three leaders from BJP have not been included in the new council of ministers, They are Mangal Pandey, Narayan Prasad and Surendra Mehta. BJP could consider a national role for Mangal Pandey, who is also West Bengal in charge, sources claimed.
Both BJP and JD (U) sought to strike a social balance by giving a good representation to EBCs as five from BJP and four from JD(U) have been made ministers. Seven Dalits have also become ministers , the OBC Luv-Kush (Kurmi-Koeri) combination also got four ministers, two each from each community. The Cabinet has nine upper caste ministers, including four Rajputs, three Bhumihars and two Brahmins. JD(U)’s Zama Khan is the only Muslim member of the Cabinet. The Cabinet has four women ministers, two each from BJP and JD(U).
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Seven new faces - BJP’s Mithilesh Tiwari, Nand Kishore Ram, Shailendra Kumar and Ramchandra Ram and JD-U’s Nishant, Shailesh Kumar alias Bulo Mandal and Shweta Gupta) - have been inducted into the cabinet.
From the BJP quota, Ram Kripal Yadav, Kedar Prasad Gupta, Nitish Mishra, Vijay Kumar Sinha, Sanjay Singh ‘Tiger’, Rama Nishad, Nand Kishore Ram, Shailesh Kumar (Engineer Shailendra), Mithilesh Tiwari, Pramod Chandravanshi, Lakhwinder Paswan, Dilip Kumar Jaiswal, Arun Shankar Prasad, Shreyasi Singh, and Ramchandra Prasad took the oath.
From the JD(U) quota, Shravan Kumar, Ashok Choudhary, Madan Sahni, Leshi Singh, Bhagwan Singh Kushwaha, Damodar Rawat, Sunil Kumar, Sheela Mandal, Ratnesh Sada, Jama Khan, Nishant Kumar, Shailesh Kumar (alias Bulo Mandal), and Rama Nishad took the oath of secrecy. Meanwhile, Santosh Kumar Suman (HAM), Sanjay Paswan (LJP-R), Sanjay Singh (LJP-R), and Deepak Prakash (RLM) were also inducted into the cabinet.
