[Tej Pratap Yadav, RJD Chief Tejashwi Yadav's brother, after taking oath as minister.]
Patna: Thirty-one legislators, including 05 Muslims and 02 Dalits, were sworn-in on Tuesday as part of Bihar's new cabinet under Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.
There are 19 Muslim MLAs in Bihar Assembly who belong to different political parties.
Following the cabinet expansion, 08 ministers belong to the Yadav community apart from Bihar Vidhan Sabha speaker: 05 ministers are from the Muslim community, 04 Dalits, 02 from Kushwaha, 02 from Kurmi, 03 from Rajput, 02 from Bhumihar, 01 from Bhahmin, 01 from Sahani, and 01 from Vaisy caste will represent the Bihar government.
Apart from these, Nitish Kumar belongs to the Kurmi community and Tejashwi Yadav is a Yadav.
As anticipated, the RJD being the single largest party in the state, has secured a lion's share of the ministerial berths.
Among the ministers who took oath on Tuesday, 16 were from RJD, 11 from Nitish Kumar's JD(U), two from the Congress, one from Jitan Ram Manjhi's Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM) and an Independent MLA.
From the JD(U) the legislators who took oath as ministers are: Vijay Kumar Chaudhary, Bijendra Prasad Yadav, Ashok Chaudhary, Sharavan Kumar, Lesi Singh, Sunil Kumar, Sheela Mandal, Jayant Raj, Mohd Zama Khan, Sanjay Jha and Madan Sahani.
From the RJD, the new ministers are: Tej Pratap Yadav, Alok Mehta, Dr Surendra Yadav, Dr Ramanand Yadav, Samir Mahasheth, Prof Chandrashekher Yadav, Anita Devi, Jitendra Rai, Sudhakar Singh, Lalit Yadav, Kumar Sarvajeet, Kartik Master, Surendra Ram, Mohammad Israil Mansuri (RJD), Shahnawaz Alam (RJD) and Shamim Ahmed.
Shahnawaz Alam, MLA from Jokihat, had won the 2020 state election as AIMIM candidate. He however ditched Owaisi and joined RJD along with 03 other AIMIM MLAs in June 2022.
From the Congress, the new ministers are: Afaq Alam and Murari Prasad Gautam. Sumit Kumar Singh is an Independent MLA and Santosh Kumar Suman is from the HAM.
The legislators took oath in the Raj Bhawan.
The total ministers in Bihar government reached 33 as Nitish Kumar and Tejashwi Yadav already took the oath of chief minister and deputy chief minister.
After the cabinet expansion of the newly-formed Bihar government, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Tuesday said that the portfolios of different ministers will be announced late evening.
Kumar has called for the first Cabinet meeting at 4.30 p.m. on Tuesday where the new Ministers will receive their portfolios.
"The distribution of the various state departments will be done during the Cabinet meeting on Tuesday. Now Bihar will move on the path of development with full speed," the Chief Minister added.
Nitish Kumar is likely to retain the Home Minister and General Administration portfolios in the Bihar government and Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Tejashwi Yadav will become the new Health Minister.
JD-U's Vijay Kumar Choudhary is expected to become the new Bihar Finance Minister. JD-U has retained all its previous Ministers and their portfolios will remain same as it was during the previous NDA government in Bihar.
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