Speculations on the long-awaited expansion of the Shivraj Singh Chouhan cabinet in Madhya Pradesh gained ground on Sunday as Chouhan left for New Delhi for the first time since becoming chief minister of the state.
He left on the state plane accompanied by state BJP president Vishnu Dutt Sharma and organizing general secretary Suhas Bhagat. The trio are likely to meet central leaders including BJP national chief J.P. Nadda, home minister Amit Shah and national organizing general secretary B.L. Santosh to finalise the names of ministers to be included in the Chouhan cabinet, sources said.
The expansion is likely to June 30 and at least nine more supporters of Rajya Sabha member Jyotiraditya Scindia, who resigned from MLA posts in March to make way for the BJP government in the state, are likely to be inducted, sources added.
The meetings of Chouhan, Sharma and Bhagat with central leaders are likely to be held on Sunday evening as well as through Monday, following which they will be back in Bhopal on Monday evening.
Expansion of the Chouhan cabinet has been held up for more than three months now and there have been several speculations about the reasons for not constituting the full cabinet. The main problem seems to be balancing the Scindia supporters with the BJP old guard.
However, sources say, there has been a broad consensus about names at the state level and the Delhi visit is to get a central stamp of approval on the list.
Chouhan had taken oath as chief minister on March 23 and on April 21 had inducted five ministers in the cabinet. Since then the speculations of expansion have been rife and several dates in May end and early June were discussed.
As of now Madhya Pradesh governor Lalji Tandon is ailing and admitted to hospital in Lucknow. Sources said that for the oath-taking ceremony, Chhattisgarh governor Anusuiya Uike might be given temporary charge of Madhya Pradesh.
The probable names
The state cabinet can have a maximum of 35 ministers including the chief minister according to provision of article 164(1)(a) of the constitution (maximum 15% of Assembly strength of 230). There is a likelihood that four to five berths will be kept vacant at the moment. This means that a maximum of 24 more ministers could be included as of now as there are already five ministers in the state.
Of these, if nine berths go to Scindia supporters (two are already ministers), then there will be only 15 berths left for the BJP’s original cadre.
Among the Scindia supporters in strong contention are ex-ministers from the Kamal Nath cabinet: Mahendra Singh Sisodia, Imarti Devi, Pradyumna Singh Tomar and Prabhuram Choudhary along with Rajyavardhan Singh Dattigaon, Aindal Singh Kansana, Hardeep Singh Dang, Ranvir Jatav and Bisahulal Singh.
Among the new names (those who have not been ministers earlier) making rounds include that of Ater (Bhind) MLA Arvind Bhadoria, Ujjain (south) MLA Mohan Yadav, Ratlam MLA Chetan Kashyap and Barwani MLA Prem Singh Patel.
Among the old guard ex-ministers Gopal Bhargava, Vijay Shah, Gaurishankar Bisen, Yashodhara Raje Scindia, Rajendra Shukla, Rampal Singh and Bhupendra Singh have been included in the likely list. Similarly, anyone from Vishwas Sarang or Rameshwar Sharma of Bhopal and Ramesh Mendola or Malini Gaud of Indore might be considered.
Other names in the contention are of ex-ministers Sanjay Pathak, Ajay Vishnoi, Nagendra Singh Nagod, Jagdish Dewda, Brijendra Singh and Harishankar Khatik.
The state leadership is said to have given the information related to probable names for cabinet expansion to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh functionaries in Madhya Pradesh—Arun Kumar and Deepak Vispute as well as the all-India publicity in-charge (prachar pramukh).
The discussion on the names continued till late on Saturday night with first Sharma and Bhagat holding a long discussion and then holding a meeting with CM Chouhan later in the night.
