Team News Riveting
Raipur, December 22
Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Vishnu Deo Sai on Friday expanded his cabinet by including nine ministers while maintaining the caste and region balance.
With the expansion, the size of the Vishnu Deo Sai cabinet in Chhattisgarh has increased to 12. Besides Sai, two Deputy Chief Ministers Arun Sao and Vijay Sharma had taken oath on December 13.
The constitutional obligation however restricts the size of Chhattisgarh cabinet to 13. Still, one post in the state cabinet has been kept vacant.
The newly inducted ministers include Brijmohan Agrawal, Ramvichar Netam, Kedar Kashyap, Dayaldas Baghel, O P Chowdhary, Lakhanlal Dewangan, Laxmi Rajwade, Shyam Bihari Jaiswal and Tankram Verma. Of these, the first four have worked as ministers in the previous BJP regimes in Chhattisgarh.
Governor Biswabhusan Harichandan administered the oath of office and secrecy to the new minister at a function held in Raj Bhawan Friday afternoon.
O P Chowdhary, who has been elected from Raigarh assembly constituency, was an Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer of 2005-batch. He quit the service while serving as District Collector of Raipur and joined the BJP in 2018.
The Chief Minister has ensured representation of all castes and regions in his cabinet. Five new faces besides an equal number of MLAs elected for the first time have been given space in the state cabinet. The 8 MLAs who had served in the previous BJP governments in the state and were elected to the present assembly were dropped.
On Thursday, the BJP bestowed the organization command to newly elected MLA Kiran Deo. The new BJP state President comes from Bastar, the southern part of the state. Chief Minister hails from Surguja divisional in the north.
