Chandrababu Naidu takes oath as Seemandhra chief minister

Vijayawada, Jun 9: Telugu Desam Party (

) chief N

was yesterday sworn in as the first chief minister of Seemandhra at a function at Nagarjuna Nagar, 18 kilometres from here.

"I will work as 'Coolie No.1' to rebuild the state into a Swarna (golden) Andhra Pradesh, a sunrise country and a knowledge hub. I will strive to make AP the No.1 state in the country with your participation and co-operation," Chandrababu said as he dedicated TDP's victory in the elections to the Telugu people.

Governor ESL Narasimhan administered the oath of office and secrecy to Chandrababu at 7.27 P.M., the auspicious time set for the occasion. Several Union ministers, chief ministers and top leaders of the BJP and other NDA parties were present on the occasion.

Chandrababu took his oath in Telugu amidst thunderous cheers by party workers. His Cabinet with 19 ministers, including three women, was also sworn in at the function. The first meeting of the Cabinet is scheduled to be held in the port city of Visakhapatnam although the date for it has not been fixed yet, Chandrababu said.

He paid obeisance at the statue of Telugu Talli (reverential mother of Telugus) on the dais before taking oath. Braving the blistering heat, lakhs of people attended the ceremony on a sprawling 70-acre open site opposite Acharya Nagarjuna University.

Union ministers Rajnath Singh, M Venkaiah Naidu, Anantha Kumar, Kalraj Mishra, Prakash Javadekar, Nirmala Sitharaman, Harsh Vardhan and Piyush Goyal attended the function. Among the chief ministers in attendance were Parkash Singh Badal of Punjab, Manohar Parrikar from Goa, Vasundhara Raje Scindia of Rajasthan, Raman Singh of Chhattisgarh and TR Zeliang of Nagaland.

PTI