Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel
Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel assigned portfolios to his Cabinet colleagues, keeping finance and mining with himself and giving the crucial home department to senior leader Tamradhwaj Sahu.
The newly-appointed ministers, who took oath early this week, have been allocated portfolios, a government public relation officer here said. Besides finance and mining, Baghel, heading the first Congress government in Chhattisgarh in 15 years, will handle general administration department, energy, public relations, electronics and information technology portfolios along with the departments not allocated to any other minister, he said.
Minister T S Singh Deo has been given key departments like panchayat and rural development, health & family welfare, medical education, planning, economics and statistics, 20- point programme and commercial taxes (GST).
Similarly, Sahu will head important departments like home, public works department ( PWD), jail, tourism, dharmsva (religious) and culture. The 69-year-old Sahu is the oldest minister in the cabinet.
The lone minister from the Muslim community, Mohammad Akbar, has been has been allotted transport, forest, housing, environment, food & civil supplies and consumer protection departments.
The youngest minister in the Cabinet, Umesh Patel (34), has been given the charge of higher education, technical education, skill development and janshakti niyojan, science and technology, sports and youth welfare departments.
Minister Jaisingh Agrawal got revenue and disaster management, rehabilitation, registrar and stamp departments while the only woman minister, Anita Bhediya, will head women and child development and social Welfare departments. Parliamentary work, law and legal affairs, agriculture and biotechnology, animal husbandry, fisheries and water resources departments were handed over to minister Ravindra Choubey. Senior tribal tribal leader and minister Kawasi Lakhma will look after commercial tax (excise) and industries.
Shiv Kumar Dahariya was given labour, urban administration and development departments, while Rudra Kumar Guru has been assigned public health and engineering along with village industries departments. Senior leader and minister Premsai Singh Tekam will look after school education, scheduled caste, scheduled tribe, other backward class and minorities welfare along with cooperative department.
The Congress returned to power in the state after 15 years, dislodging the
Raman Singh-led BJP government in the November polls.
The Congress bagged 68 of the 90 seats in the Assembly, while the BJP won only 15 seats.
Deo and Sahu were sworn in as ministers along with Baghel on December 17.
Last Tuesday, Baghel had expanded his Cabinet by inducting nine more ministers, who had taken oath at a function in Raipur.
The total strength of the Cabinet now stood at 12, including the chief minister.
Chhattisgarh Cabinet Expansion Sees 3 Tribal Leaders, Including a Woman, Named Ministers
Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel on Tuesday led the first expansion of his Cabinet by inducting nine Congress MLAs, including a woman legislator, as ministers. Baghel took oath as Chhattisgarh Chief Minister on December 17, after the Congress won the state Assembly election with a thumping majority. Two other senior Congress leaders and legislators, TS Singh Deo and Tamradhwaj Sahu, were also sworn in as Ministers that day.
Sahu is a prominent OBC face of the Congress in Chhattisgarh while Deo represents the general category.
Of the nine new faces inducted into the cabinet on Tuesday, two represent the SCs, three STs, one each is from the OBC, minority and the general categories.
The Chhattisgarh Cabinet can have a maximum of 13 ministers, including the Chief Minister.
With the 2019 Lok Sabha elections round the corner, caste equations assume importance in the state. Congress working presidents — Shiv Deharia and Guru Rudra Kumar, from the SC community, have been offered ministerial berths.
Guru Rudra Kumar represents the influential Satnami sect in Chhattisgarh.
Among others, senior MLAs – Ravindra Chaubey and Jai Singh Agrawal come from general category, Kawardha MLA Md Akbar is a former minister and represents minority community while the lone woman minister in the cabinet – Anila Bhedia — hails from the ST community and is the senior most woman MLA of the state Congress.
Former Ajit Jogi close aide and the Konta MLA Kawasi Lakhma and Pratapur MLA Dr Premsai Singh Tekam also represent the STs. Umesh Patel, 35, son of former Congress veteran Nand Kumar Patel, is the young face of the cabinet who had defeated bureaucrat-turnedpolitician OP Chaudhary from Kharasia Assembly seat which was earlier represented by his father. Durg region has maximum representation in the cabinet with five ministers from the region — Ravindra Chaubey, Tamradhwaj Sahu, Anila Bhedia, Md Akbar and Rudra Guru, besides the Chief Minister himself, who comes from Patan in Durg. Kawasi Lakhma and Shiv Deharia represent Bastar and Raipur region respectively. Lakhma is among few survivors of the Jhiram valley attack which had wiped out the Congress top leadership in 2013.
After the swearing in, supporters of senior MLA Dhanendra Sahu gathered at the PCC and raised slogans in their leader’s support who was denied a ministerial berth. The party workers also took objections to excessive representation offered to Durg region in the cabinet expansion. With the name of senior leader Charandas Mahant missing from the cabinet, speculations are rife that he could be appointed speaker of the Assembly or could be given any key responsibility in New Delhi.