Nitish Kumar to expand his cabinet today; 16 ministers from RJD, 11 from JD(U) to be inducted

Patna, Aug 16: Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar will expand his cabinet today. A total of 31 MLAs including one independent are likely to take oath as ministers. The RJD, which has the highest number of 79 MLAs in the Bihar Assembly, is likely to get 16 ministerial berths and the JD(U) which has 45 MLAs is likely to keep 11.

Jitan Ram Manjhi's Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM) is likely to get one ministerial berth and Congress, which is part of the Grand alliance, is likely to have two Cabinet berths. Left parties having 16 MLAs will not be the part of the government.

The swearing-in will take place at 11.30 AM inside the Raj Bhavan, according to PTI reports.

The state cabinet can have up to 36 ministers, including the chief minister. An in-principle agreement has been reached that the RJD, which is the largest party in the state assembly, will have a lion's share of ministerial berths, followed by Kumar's JD(U). The induction of ministers is expected to keep a few berths vacant for future expansion.

JD(U) leader Nitish Kumar, who recently sworn in as Bihar chief minister for a record eighth time, is expected to retain the all-important Home portfolio, while the RJD may get most of the departments that were previously with the BJP, news wire agency PTI had claimed earlier quoting a highly-placed source.

Nitish Kumar himself will be keeping Home, which helps him have a control over the police. He is likely to also keep the departments related to welfare of extremely backward castes and minorities, which form his core constituency.

While Tejashwi Yadav is certain to become the deputy CM, it is not yet decided which portfolios he will keep.

However, it is expected that JD(U) will retain its existing ministries such as Home, Vigilance, Education, Building Construction, Minority Affairs, Social Welfare, and Water Resources. Meanwhile, RJD is set to get ministries such as Finance, Commercial Taxes, Health, Road Construction, Disaster Management, and Environment and Forest.

From the RJD camp, the list of probable ministers includes Tej Pratap Yadav, Surendra Yadav, Ramanand Yadav, Bhai Virendra, Lalit Yadav, Anita Devi, Kumar Sarvjeet, Alok Mehta, Mohammed Shamim, Shahnawaz Alam, Sudhakar Singh, and Samir Mahaseth or Sanjay Gupta, reports The Indian Express.