The new Yogi Adityanath government has included 31 new faces, retaining 21 ministers to balance the youth and experience, ahead of the 2024 parliamentary elections. The ruling BJP took into account caste and regional aspirations in selecting ministers to consolidate its hold on the politically important state which sends a maximum of 80 members to the Lok Sabha.
On Friday, Adityanath was sworn in as Uttar Pradesh chief minister for a second term at a function where 52 other ministers were sworn in. Of the 52 new ministers in the Adityanath government 2.0, 36 are between 40 and 60 years of age and two are between 40 and 12 years of age.
Minister of State (Independent Responsibility) Arun Kumar Saxena, Bereli’s third term MLA, is the eldest at 73 years old, and his colleague Sandeep Singh, grandson of veteran BJP leader Kalyan Singh, the youngest at 31 years old. There are many undergraduates and graduates in the cabinet, with a few who have only studied up to 8th grade.
The new party has 19 ministers from the Electoral Influential Other Backward Classes (OBCs). It includes seven members of the Thakur and Brahmin communities, eight members of the Dalits and four members of the Vaishya community. The council also has a Muslim and a Sikh. For geographical representation, there are now 23 ministers from western Uttar Pradesh, up from 12 in the last term; 14 from Eastern UP, three less than the previous one and 12 from the central part of the state, one less than last time.
This time Deputy Chief Minister Dinesh Sharma was among the nine ministers who were left out. Others who have not found a place in the new ministry are Satish Mahana, Rampati Shastri, Joy Pratap Shahi and Siddharth Nath Singh and Srikanth Sharma, two prominent faces often seen on TV screens. The new entrants to the cabinet are Baby Rani Maurya, Jaybir Singh, IAS-turned-politician AK Sharma, Rakesh Sachan and two of the allies – Ashish Patel of his own party (Sonelal) and Sanjay Nishad of Nishad.
Among the new faces (in independent charge) among the state ministers are Asim Arun, who resigned as an IPS officer to join politics, and Daya Shankar Singh, who had earlier made headlines due to marital disputes with his ex-minister’s wife Swati Singh. A look at the academic background of the ministers shows that Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and his two deputies Keshab Prasad Maurya and Brijesh Pathak are graduates.
AK Sharma, Jitin Prasada, Anil Rajvar, Rakesh Sachan, and Yogendra Upadhyay have postgraduate degrees. Nanda Gopal Nandi, Sanjay Nishad, and Jaybir Singh Intermediate Pass.
In MoS (Independent Responsibility) JPS Rathore M.Tech and Dharmabir Butterfly 8 class pass. In MoS, Somendra S. Tomar did his PhD. While Dinesh Khatik and Rakesh Rathore studied up to 8th class.
The new cabinet includes five women, including Baby Rani Maurya.
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