Jharkhand Governor Droupadi Murmu will administer the oath of office to chief minister-designate Hemant Soren at 2pm on December 29. Chief Secretary D.K. Tiwari called on Soren at his Kanke Road residence here during the day and handed him the invitation for the ceremony.
"Governor Droupadi Murmu will administer the oath to Hemant Soren as chief minister at 2 pm on December 29 at Morabadi Ground [in Ranchi]," the communique said. Soren had called on the governor at the Raj Bhavan on December 24 to stake claim to form the government and submitted a letter of support of 50 MLAs to her.
The JMM on Thursday said the governor has invited Soren to take oath as the chief minister. The JMM-Congress-RJD alliance stormed to power in Jharkhand on December 23, ousting the BJP in yet another state in the Hindi heartland after the saffron party's stupendous performance in the Lok Sabha elections.
Hemant hails from the powerful Soren family from the tribal-dominated region of Santhal Pargana. The party had formed an alliance with the Congress and the RJ(D). He contested from both the Barhait and Dumka legislative seats; the latter comes under the Dumka parliamentary constituency. Santhal Pargana, with its 16 assembly seats, has been a JMM stronghold since the formation of Jharkhand in the 2000s.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, former president Pranab Mukherjee, chief ministers Mamata Banerjee and Uddhav Thackeray, Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi are among those invited to Jharkhand chief minister-designate Hemant Soren's swearing-in ceremony today.
The others invited to the programme to be held at the sprawling Mohrabadi grounds are Congress leader P. Chidambaram, Ahmed Patel, NCP chief Sharad Yadav, SP leader Akhilesh Yadav and BSP supremo Mayawati.
Chief ministers of Rajasthan, Chhatisgarh Madhya Pradesh and Delhi Ashok Gehlot, Bhupesh Baghel, Kamalnath and Arvind Kejriwal respectively have been invited. Rajya Sabha deputy chairperson Harivansh is also in the long list of invitees, as is the outgoing chief minister Raghubar Das.
The three-party alliance bagged 47 seats in the 81-member state assembly. The JMM won 30 seats, Congress 16 and the RJD one.
JVM(P), with its three MLAs, has extended 'unconditional support' to Soren to form the government. The BJP clinched 25 seats, AJSU Party two, the CPI-ML(Liberation) and the NCP one each and others two.
The results of the election, which was held in five phases between November 30 and December 20, was announced on December 23.
-Inputs from PTI
