Kamal Nath to take oath as Madhya Pradesh CM on Dec 17

Chief Minister-designate Kamal Nath will take the oath of the office on December 17 at Bhopal’s Lal Parade ground. It was on this ground that Uma Bharti had been sworn in as chief minister 15 years ago.

Nath said only he will take oath in the function and his future cabinet will be sworn-in later.

MPCC president Kamal Nath was elected Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader in a meeting of party MLAs on Thursday night. The CLP adopted its earlier one-line resolution that had authorised Congress president Rahul Gandhi to select its leader.

The Bhopal meeting followed Rahul’s interaction with Kamal Nath and the other aspirant for the chief minister post, Jyotiraditya Scindia, in New Delhi. Soon after the meeting with the Congress president, both the state leaders rushed in the night to Bhopal. In presence of Scindia, central observer A K Antony announced the party high command’s choice.

Four chief ministers, Mamta Banerjee (West Bengal), H D Kumaraswamy (Karnataka), Arvind Kejriwal (Delhi) and Chandrababu Naidu ( Andhra Pradesh), are likely to be invited to for swearing-in ceremony on December 17.

The Congress president and his mother Ms Sonia Gandhi are also expected to take part in the function. Other national leaders including former J & K chief minister Farooq Abdullah and his son Omar, Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav and RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav are also among the probable invitees.

Businessman-politician Kamal Nath is also said to have planned to invite his half a dozen business tycoon friends.

Hours after being elected CLP leader, Kamal Nath called on Governor Anandiben Patel and staked a claim for forming the government. He was accompanied by AICC general secretary Deepak Bavaria, Jyotiraditya Scindia and former PCC president Arun Yadav.

Talking to newsmen, the CM-designate said he would fulfil the promise of loan waiver for farmers within 10 days of taking the oath.

“Not only the loan waiver but all other promises we made to the people in our manifesto will also be fulfilled,” he added.

On the possibility of a probe into the Vyapam scam, he remarked, “We want to expose all the scams and for this purpose, a people’s commission will be set up as per our manifesto."