Nitish sworn in as CM

From JD (U) party – Nitish Kumar, Rajiv Ranjan Singh, Lallan Bijendra Prasad Yadav, Shrawan Kumar, Jay Kumar Singh, Maheshwar Hazari, Krishna Nandan Prasad Verma, Santosh Nirala Khurshid alias Firoz Ahmad Shailesh Kumar, Kumari Manju Varma, Madan Sahni, Kapildeo Kamat.

Mr. Kumar, 64, was administered the oaths of office and secrecy by Governor Ramnath Kovind at a ceremony at the historic Gandhi Maidan here, watched by thousands of supporters and dozens of leaders from several non-BJP parties.

It is the fifth time engineer-turned-politician Nitish Kumar was sworn-in as the chief minister.

Criticising Kejriwal for hugging RJD chief and former Bihar Chief Minister Lalu Prasad during Nitish Kumar’s swearing-in ceremony in Patna, Bhushan said “it was a betrayal of the dreams of Anna Hazare”. With preliminary euphoria of crushing Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) over, Kumar will probably be charting into a brand new territory as he’s going to share energy together with his bitter rival-turned-pal Lalu Prasad Yadav, who in his previous avatar was seen because the fountain head of mass corruption.

Deputy chief minister Tejaswi Yadav was not present at the meeting, which was attended by chief secretary Anjani Kumar Singh and state police chief P.K. Thakur.

Abdul Bari Siddiqui Elected 7 times, he is the most recognised Muslim face of RJD. In contrast, Bihar, helped by economic reforms carried out by Nitish Kumar government, witnessed marginal fall in the percentage of population below the poverty line. Tejawi will become Deputy Chief Minister. Lalu’s RJD is the single largest party in the Assembly with 80 seats followed by the JD-U (71) and the Congress (27). CPI-M’s Sitaram Yechury and CPI’s D Raja also attended the event.

A senior JD(U) leader said “this was not just a mandate for the Assembly election, it was a message from the people for us”, indicating that Mr Nitish Kumar will be the “prime ministerial candidate” in the next Lok Sabha election. This time, he is heading an alliance government with the RJD and Congress. Lalu Prasad’s younger son Tejaswi Yadav is expected to get a plum post.

State Congress president Ashok Choudhary has been allotted human resources department while his party colleague Madan Mohan Jha has been alloted revenue portfolio.

The cabinet quota is fixed upto 15% of the House strength which means that Nitish Kumar could have a maximum of 36 members in the ministry including himself.