BJP MPs Rajnath Singh, Amit Shah, Nitin Gadkari and others during the swearing-in ceremony of the new Union government, at the Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi.
Credit: PTI Photo
New Delhi: Uttar Pradesh and Bihar appear to have got the maximum representation in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's new council of ministers, while assembly poll-bound Maharashtra also found a significant presence.
Uttar Pradesh, which sends the most members, 80, to the Lok Sabha, has got nine ministerial berths, which includes one Cabinet, while Bihar has bagged four cabinet berths out of a total of eight ministers from the state.
Maharashtra has six ministerial berths, including two Cabinet ministers, while Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan have five members each in the council of ministers that was sworn in on Sunday.
Haryana, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu have three ministerial berths each.
Odisha, Assam, Jharkhand, Telangana, Punjab, West Bengal and Kerala have two ministerial berths in the council of ministers.
Rajnath Singh is the sole cabinet minister from Uttar Pradesh, while Gujarat's four cabinet ministers include Prime Minister Modi, Amit Shah, Mansukh Mandaviya and C R Paatil.
Bihar's four cabinet ministers include former chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi from HAM(S), Rajiv Ranjan Singh 'Lalan' from JD(U), Giriraj Singh from BJP and Chirag Paswan from LJP (RV).
Madhya Pradesh has three cabinet berths -- former chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Virendra Kumar and Jyotiraditya Scindia, while Nitin Gadkari and Piyush Goyal represent Maharashtra in the cabinet.
Tamil Nadu has two prominent cabinet ministers in Nirmala Sitharaman and S Jaishankar and L Murugan as Minister of State. Murugan, who lost the Nilgiris Lok Sabha seat, is a Rajya Sabha member from Madhya Pradesh.
Sitharaman and Jaishankar are Rajya Sabha members from Karnataka and Gujarat respectively.
Rajasthan has three cabinet berths -- Ashwini Vaishnaw, Bhupender Yadav and Gajendra Singh Shekhawat -- and Arjun Ram Meghwal as Minister of State (Independent Charge). Vaishnaw, who hails from Rajasthan, is a Rajya Sabha member from Odisha.
Dharmendra Pradhan and Jual Oram represent Odisha in the Cabinet.
Karnataka has two cabinet ministers -- former chief minister H D Kumaraswamy and Pralhad Joshi.
BJP President Jagat Prakash Nadda, former chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal, Annpurna Devi, Kiren Rijiju are cabinet ministers from Himachal Pradesh, Assam, Jharkhand and Arunachal Pradesh respectively.
Manohar Lal Khattar, K Ram Mohan Naidu, G Kishan Reddy and Hardeep Singh Puri represent Haryana, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Punjab in the cabinet. Puri is a Rajya Sabha member from Uttar Pradesh.
Among Ministers of State (Independent Charge) RLD chief Jayant Chaudhary is from Uttar Pradesh, Shiv Sena leader Prataprao Jadhav from Maharashtra, Rao Inderjit Singh from Haryana, Arjun Ram Meghwal from Rajasthan and Jitendra Singh from Jammu and Kashmir.
Actor-turned-politician Suresh Gopi, who won from Thrissur Lok Sabha seat, and senior BJP leader from Kerala George Kurian have been appointed Ministers of State.