Nitish retains Home, Administration; gives 22 depts. to BJP, 19 to his party
A day after the expansion of his Cabinet, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Saturday allocated portfolios to the Ministers. He retained important portfolios for himself such as Home, General Administration, Cabinet Secretariat, Election, and Vigilance.
A total of 45 departments were distributed among 30 Ministers. As the Bharatiya Janata Party has more MLAs in comparison to the Janata Dal (United), the distribution of departments has been done accordingly.
The BJP has stake in 22 departments, whereas the JD(U) has 19. Three departments have been given to Santosh Kumar Suman, son of former CM Jitan Ram Manjhi. Independent MLA Sumit Kumar Singh has been given one department — Science, Technology and Technical Educational.
Five departments have been distributed among the two Deputy CMs Samrat Choudhary and Vijay Kumar Sinha. Mr. Choudhary has been allotted the Finance and Commercial
Taxes departments, whereas Mr. Sinha has got Road Construction, Mines and Geology, along with the Art, Culture and Youth Affairs departments.
Senior JD(U) leader Vijay Kumar Choudhary has been made Minister of Water Resources and Parliamentary Affairs. Another senior leader, Bijendra Prasad Yadav, has been allotted the Energy department as well as the Planning and Development department.
The most important part is the allocation of the Education department which has always remained in the news for tussle with Raj Bhavan. Former IPS officer Sunil Kumar has been made the Education Minister.
Prem Kumar has been given the Cooperative department as well Environment, Forest and Climate Change department. Shravan Kumar has been made the Rural Development Minister. Renu Devi, who was earlier Deputy CM, has been given the responsibility of Animal and Fish Resources department. Mangal Pandey will be heading the Health and Agriculture departments. Both the portfolios were earlier with the RJD lawmakers.