Ministers from the Bharatiya Janata Party, Janata Dal (United) and other National Democratic Alliance allies took oath on Thursday as part of a major expansion of the Samrat Choudhary-led Bihar cabinet. The swearing-in ceremony was held at Gandhi Maidan in Patna in the presence of top NDA leaders.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, Bihar Chief Minister Samrat Choudhary and several senior leaders of the alliance attended the event. With the expansion, Nitish Kumar's son Nishant made his ministerial debut by getting inducted into the expanded cabinet.
Ministers who took oath
Among those sworn in as ministers were Shrawon Kumar, Vijay Kumar Sinha, Dilip Kumar Jaiswal, Nishant Kumar, Leshi Singh, Ram Kripal Yadav, Nitish Mishra, Damodar Rawat, Sanjay Singh alias Tiger and Ashok Choudhary, along with several other leaders from NDA constituent parties.
The cabinet expansion comes months after the NDA registered a sweeping victory in the Bihar Assembly elections, winning 202 out of the 243 seats and securing a commanding three-fourths majority in the House.
Within the alliance, the BJP won 89 seats while the JD(U) secured 85. The Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) won 19 seats, the Hindustani Awam Morcha (Secular) bagged five, and the Rashtriya Lok Morcha secured four seats.
The opposition Mahagathbandhan was reduced to 35 seats. The Rashtriya Janata Dal emerged as the largest opposition party with 25 seats, followed by the Congress with six seats and CPI(ML)(L) with two. The Indian Inclusive Party and CPI(M) won one seat each, while AIMIM secured five seats and the BSP won one seat.
Nitish Kumar’s transition to Rajya Sabha
Nitish Kumar had taken oath as Chief Minister for a record 10th time on November 20 in the presence of Prime Minister Modi and other senior NDA leaders.
However, on March 30, Nitish Kumar resigned as a member of the Bihar Legislative Council, signalling his transition to the Rajya Sabha and paving the way for a leadership change in the state.
Samrat Choudhary becomes Bihar’s first BJP CM
Samrat Choudhary was later sworn in as the first Bharatiya Janata Party Chief Minister of Bihar, ending Nitish Kumar’s 21-year tenure at the helm of the state.
To maintain balance within the coalition, JD(U) veterans Vijay Kumar Choudhary and Bijendra Prasad Yadav were appointed as Deputy Chief Ministers.
Earlier, Samrat Choudhary comfortably won the trust vote in the 243-member Bihar Assembly, reaffirming the unity of the NDA alliance and formally completing the political transition in the state following Nitish Kumar’s resignation from the chief minister’s post.