The first and the much-awaited cabinet expansion of the three-month-old AAP government in Punjab was carried out on Monday with the induction of five news ministers amid an onslaught by the opposition raising questions over the performance of the Bhagwant Mann dispensation.
Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann said that all the 92 MLAs cannot be given a berth, and those who couldn’t be accommodated in the cabinet will be given other responsibilities.
The five new ministers are – Anmol Gagan Mann, the legislator from Kharar, Aman Arora, MLA from Sunam, Inderbir Singh Nijjar, Amritsar South MLA, Fauja Singh Sarari, MLA from Guruharsahai, and Chetan Singh Jouramajra, Samana seat legislator.
CM Mann had dashed off to Delhi a few days back to finalise the expansion after consultation with the AAP convenor and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.
In picking the new entrants to the Mann cabinet, the AAP factored in caste, gender, religion and regional considerations. Considering the political significance of the region, four out of the five new cabinet ministers are from Malwa region, while one is from Majha. Sarari, a retired policeman, belongs to the Rai Sikh community.
Infusing fresh blood as well as giving more representation to the woman, Anmol Gagan Mann, the MLA from Kharar, has been given a cabinet berth. She is the second woman in the Mann-led cabinet.
Dr Nijjar, president of Chief Khalsa Diwan, was initially made the Pro Tem Speaker before Kultar Singh Sandhwan was elected the Vidhan Sabha Speaker.
Aman Arora is a second-term MLA and had won the Assembly election with the highest margin of 75,000 votes. His entry into the cabinet was considered a foregone conclusion when the AAP government had been elected but his exclusion then had raised eyebrows.
Jouramajra comes from the politically crucial Patiala district.
With the expansion, five of the eight vacant slots in the council of ministers have been filled. One of the vacancies occurred following the ouster of Health Minister Dr Vijay Singla on corruption charges.
However, the government’s decision to not pick former IPS officer Kunwar Vijay Pratap Singh – who had initially probed the sacrilege cases in the state – for the cabinet expansion raised eyebrows. He was ignored during the first cabinet induction too.
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