Ranchi. The cabinet expansion of Champai Soren government in Jharkhand will take place on 16 February. It is believed that there will be four to five new faces in the new cabinet. Two of the new ministers will get the status of Deputy CM. Of these, one will be from JMM and the other from Congress quota.
Alamgir Alam, one of the four faces who got a place in Hemant Soren’s cabinet from Congress quota, took the oath along with CM Champai Soren on 2 February. There is talk of replacing two of the remaining three faces. Among these, Dr. Rameshwar Oraon was the Minister of Finance and Planning and Food Supply and Public Distribution in the previous government. He is 76 years old and can be dropped based on age criteria.
In a recent program, he praised the tenure of Babulal Marandi, the state president of BJP and the first Chief Minister of the state. A camp of Jharkhand Congress has conveyed this news to the top leadership of the party. Similarly, Banna Gupta, who was the Health Minister in the Hemant government, has also been in controversies regarding a viral video of his conversation with a woman and some cases of departmental irregularities. However, he has been the most vocal among all the Congress ministers.
Badal Patralekh, the fourth minister from the Congress quota, comes from Santhal Pargana area. In his place, Deepika Pandey Singh may get a chance, who represents Mahagama assembly constituency of Santhal. Of the 17 Congress MLAs in the state, four are women. There has been a demand to give a place to one of these in the cabinet since the time of Hemant Soren government. Deepika Pandey Singh has been counted among the trusted youth leaders of Rahul Gandhi camp. For this reason his claim is considered strong.
However, Jharia MLA Purnima Neeraj Singh and Barkagaon MLA Amba Prasad have also put forward their claims before the party leaders. The final decision on the names of Congress quota ministers will be taken by the party high command in Delhi. The situation regarding this may become clear by Thursday.
In JMM, Hemant Soren’s younger brother Basant Soren and sister-in-law Sita Soren both have stakes in the ministerial post, but only one of them is likely to get the place.
There is discussion that Sita Soren can be given the status of minister by making her the chairperson of the Women’s Commission or any other commission. According to the strength of MLAs in Jharkhand, there can be a maximum of 12 ministers in the cabinet. There were only 11 ministers in Hemant Soren’s government.
