MP Cabinet expansion: State govt finally gets Health Minister to tackle coronavirus

Bhopal, Apr 22: A day after Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan inducted five ministers into to Cabinet, the state government finally appointed Narottam Mishra as the state Health Minister.

Narottam Mishra played a crucial role in destabilising Kamal Nath-led Congress government in March.

It could seen that Mishra was earlier a chief minister aspirant before the BJP top leadership took sides towards Shivraj Singh Chauhan. Apart from health ministry, Mishra would also head the home department.

Narottam Mishra is widely known to be Jyotiraditya Scindia's loyalist. Gobind Singh Rajpoot, another Scindia loyalist, has been given the charge of the cooperative and food and civil supplies departments.

After allotting the portfolios to the ministers, Chauhan said, "The portfolios have been allotted keeping the coronavirus scare in mind. This team will coordinate in fighting the scare and a full-fledged expansion of the cabinet will happen after the lockdown."

On Tuesday CM Shivraj Singh Chauhan inducted five ministers in his Cabinet, including three senior BJP MLAs and two former MLAs who are loyalists of former Congress leader Jyotiraditya Scindia.

Along with former parliamentary affairs minister Narottam Mishra, former revenue minister Kamal Patel, an OBC leader from Harda district, and senior BJP leader Meena Singh, Tulsiram Silawat and Govind Rajput took oath.

Since Chauhan took oath on March 23, he was the only minister in the state cabinet. As the deadly coronavirus began to throttle the number of positive cases in the state, Chouhan was criticised by the Opposition for not expanding his Cabinet and proving unequal to the task.