New ministers in Shivraj govt allotted portfolios
BHOPAL: Madhya Pradesh (MP) chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan allocated portfolios on Monday morning among 28 new ministers, who were inducted in the cabinet on July 2 , and five others inducted earlier, with senior BJP leader Jyotiraditya Scindia’s imprint being visible in the exercise.
The current strength of the Chouhan cabinet is 34, including the CM, while one ministerial berth is still vacant. In the first cabinet expansion exercise carried out on April 21, almost a month after Chouhan assumed office for a fourth term, five ministers were inducted including two Scindia loyalists, Tulsiram Silavat and Govind Singh Rajput. The others inducted were Narottam Mishra, Kamal Patel and Meena Singh.
Silavat and Rajput are among six leaders who were ministers in the Congress government that governeed the state till March. The others are Dr Prabhuram Chaudhary, Mahendra Singh Sisodia, Pradyumn Singh Tomar and Imrati Devi.
These ministers resigned from the state assembly along with 16 other MLAs, all loyalists of Scindia, in March in an act of rebellion against the then chief minister Kamal Nath and thus, paved way for formation of the BJP government headed by Shviraj Singh Chouhan.
Of the 16, 12 got ministerial berths in the July 2 cabinet expansion.
While Silavat retained the water resources portfolio, he was also assigned an additional department, fisheries welfare and development. Similarly, Rajput was allocated transport and revenue, the same portfolios he had in the then Nath cabinet.
Dr Prabhuram Chaudhary who has an MBBS degree will be the new health minister of the state.
Mahendra Singh Sisodia was minister for Labour in the then Congress government, is now minister for rural development and Panchayi Raj. And Imrati Devi has retained the women and child development department.
Narottam Mishra from Gwalior-Chambal region continues to maintain his No. 2 position in the cabinet , with home and also being allocated Jail, Parliamentary affairs and Law and Legislative affairs. His name appears in the list of ministers immediately after the CM.
Another BJP heavyweight Gopal Bhargava who is the senior most lawmaker in the state assembly was given PWD and Cottage and village industries. His name appears at No. 3 in the list. B
A senior leader in the BJP Jagdish Devda is the new Finance minister.
Vijay Shah from a tribal royal family in Nimad region is the new forest minister in the government.
Reacting to the portfolio allocation state Congress spokesperson Abhay Dubey said, “This was not portfolio allocation but an exercise to distribute lucrative departments among certain top leaders.”
Urban administration and development minister Bhupendra Singh said, “There is nothing like a lucrative department in the government. There has been a delay but the chief minister allocated the portfolios having looked into all the aspects. There is no outsider in the cabinet. We are all from the same family.”