Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Sunday inducted 21 ministers, including five women and seven first-time MPs, for the 2024 assembly elections.
This comes a day after the resignation of all 20 ministers of Odisha.
shuffle The cabinet has cleared several controversial faces and introduced a combination of young and experienced leaders of the BJD.
The swearing-in ceremony took place at the new convention center of Lok Seva Bhawan in Bhubaneswar, during which 13 cabinet ministers and eight ministers of state (independent charge) in the state council of ministers headed by Naveen Patnaik took oath.
Of the five women MLAs, three were inducted as cabinet ministers.
The newly inducted women cabinet ministers are Pramila Malik, Usha Devi and Tukuni Sahu.
Jagannath Sarka, Niranjan Pujari, Ranendra Pratap Swain, Prafulla Kumar Malik, Pratap Keshari Deb and Atanu Sabyasachi Nayak are among Biju Janata Dal (BJD) MLAs who took oath as new cabinet ministers. Governor Ganeshi Lal also administered the oath of office and secrecy to Pradeep Kumar Amat, Naba Kishore Das, Ashok Chandra Panda and Rajendra Dholakia at the ceremony.
The legislators inducted as Ministers of State (Independent Charge) are Samir Ranjan Das, Ashwini Kumar Patra, Pritiranjan Gharai, Srikant Sahu, Tusharkanti Behera, Rohit Pujari, Rita Sahu and Basanti Hembram.
News agency ANI The report said some ministers who performed well in their respective offices and were still dropped from the cabinet are likely to get important responsibilities in the party organization in view of the next election.
The Naveen Patnaik government completed three years of its fifth consecutive term as the Chief Minister of Odisha on May 29.
This was the first time in the political history of Odisha that all ministers were directed to step down.
A day after the ruling BJD won three Rajya Sabha seats and the bypolls to the Brajrajnagar assembly constituency, the exercise of reshuffling the ministry has begun.