JOIN USRajasthan CM allocates portfolios to ministers, retains home and finance
A day after inducting 12 fresh faces, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot on Monday allocated portfolios to ministers while retaining crucial ministries of Home, Finance and Information Technology.
Pilot supporters Hemarach Chaudhary will be the new Forest Minister while Ramesh Meena will look after Panchayati Raj and Rural Development.
Vishvendra Singh will look after Tourism, as he was doing before he was sacked along with Meena last July following rebellion against Gehlot. Meena was Food and Civil Supplies Minister when sacked and this ministry will now be looked after by Pratap Singh Khachariawas.
One of the two Ministers of State from the Pilot camp, Muralilal Meena, has been assigned Agriculture Marketing and Estate with independent charge and will assist Singh in Tourism and Civil Aviation. Bijendra Ola, another MoS from Pilot camp, has been given transport and road safety with independent charge.
Most of the Ministers who were not changed have retained their ministries — Shanti Dhariwal retains Parliamentary affairs, Saleh Mohammad Minority Affairs, Pramod Jain Bhaya mines and petroleum, Lalchand Kataria agriculture and Udailal Anjana cooperative. BD Kalla gets Education (Primary and Secondary), Sanskrit education and Culture while Parsadi Lal Meena has been assigned health.
Though the reshuffle, a demand vociferously raised by Pilot, has contained the infighting, there are still embers of discontent. An MLA Dayaram Parmar wrote to Gehlot on Sunday itself asking what are the qualities that are needed to become a minister and whether he could acquire those so that he becomes eligible for the post.
The elevation of Tikaram Jully was also not well received by Congress MLA Johari Lal Meena who alleged that a corrupt person got the promotion while Shafia Zubair claimed that people with "bad reputation" have got promotion and the women were not represented properly.
The reshuffle took place on Sunday after Gehlot shed his reluctance to include Pilot's supporters in his team, after the Congress High Command made it clear that he needed to be accommodative.
Gehlot and Pilot were locked in internal strife over the leadership question and the latter had moved his supporting MLAs out of Jaipur in July last year but deft political maneuvering by the Chief Minister had saved the government.
Pilot, who was state party chief, had been hoping to be the Chief Minister when Congress won the Assembly elections in 2018 but with a large majority of MLAs opted for Gehlot as their leader.
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