BJP bags key posts in Bihar cabinet rejig
Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar inducted 17 new ministers into his cabinet on Tuesday ahead of the Budget session of the legislature, heralding a generational shift by making room for several new faces in the coalition between his Janata Dal (United), or JD(U), and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Governor Phagu Chouhan administered the oath of office to the new ministers — nine from the BJP and eight from the JD(U) — in a ceremony at Raj Bhawan. The exercise took the strength of the Nitish Kumar cabinet to 30, with six berths still vacant. The portfolio distribution also showed the impact of induction
PATNA:
of 11 new faces in the cabinet, with several key departments going to first-time ministers.
Former Union minister and BJP national spokesman Shahnawaz Hussain, who was recently elected to the Bihar legislative council, was sworn in. BJP also inducted former MP Janak Ram into the cabinet. From the last cabinet, BJP has retained only two ministers this time – Mangal Pandey and Pramod Kumar.
BJP insiders said a gradual generational shift was taking place in the party with more space being made for new and young leaders. “There is always an attempt to maintain broader regional balance, though the number of ministers in the cabinet is limited,” Kumar said.→p10
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday protected Congress MP Shashi Tharoor and journalist Rajdeep Sardesai from arrest in several cases registered against them for posting “misleading” tweets over the death of a young protester during the tractor rally organised by farmers in the Capital on January 26 even as the solicitor-general of India sought to highlight the “horrendous” effect of their social media posts.
Apart from Tharoor and Sardesai, the top court also stayed arrest of five journalists — Mrinal Pande, Zafar Agha, Vinod Jose, Paresh Nath and Anant Nath — and fixed the matter for a hearing after two weeks.
A bench headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) SA Bobde issued the interim order of protection after solicitor general Tushar Mehta, who appeared for Delhi Police and the Uttar Pradesh government, refrained from offering an assurance that Tharoor and the six journalists will not be arrested until the time the court hears the matter.
Instead, Mehta sought to emphasise the negative impact of the social media posts. “This court may not be aware of the horrendous effect these twitter handles (of Tharoor and others) have. Most of them have followings in lakhs,” he submitted.
The genesis of the cases against them were tweets in which Tharoor and Sardesai, a TV journalist, attributed the death of a protester during the tractor rally in the Capital to police firing.