Samikhsya Bureau
Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik, who led the Biju Janata Dal to a landslide victory in the assembly election, has chosen his council of ministers. On the recommendation of Patnaik, governor Ganeshi Lal on Tuesday appointed the 11 cabinet ministers and nine ministers of state.
There are 10 new faces among the ministers. Two of them, Jharsuguda MLA Naba Kishore Das and Titlagarh MLA Tukuni Sahu, have been appointed as cabinet ministers. Eight others including Telkoi MLA Prenanda Nayak, Nimapara MLA Sameer Das, Kotpad MLA Padmini Dian, Balikuda-Erasama MLA Raghunandan Das, Junagarh MLA Dibyashankar Mishra, Bissam Cuttack MLA Jagannath Saraka, Simulia MLA Jyotiprakash Panigarhi, and Kakatpur MLA Tusharkanti Behera have been made ministers of state.
Patnaik is scheduled to take oath for a record fifth term on Wednesday at the IDCO Exhibition ground in Bhubaneswar. All ministers will take oath after him.
The number of ministers within 15 per cent of the strength of the assembly as per Sarkaria Commission’s guideline. The BJD won 112 of the 146 assembly seats for which election was held in four phases in Odisha.
The list of cabinet ministers and ministers of state in Patnaik’s new team is as follows:
Cabinet ministers:
- Ranendra Pratap Swain
- Bikram Keshari Arukha
- Prafulla Mallick
- Padmanabh Behera
- Pratap Jena
- Niranjan Pujari
- Arun Sahoo
- Sudam Marandi
- Sushant Singh
- Naba Kishore Das
- Tukuni Sahu
Ministers of state:
- Ashok Chandra Panda
- Sameer Ranjan Dash
- Jyoti Prakash Panigrahi
- Dibya Shankar Mishra
- Premananda Nayak
- Raghunandan Das
- Padmini Dian
- Tusharkanti Behera
- Jagannath Saraka
