Bihar govt formation: 'Congress likely to get 4 ministerial berths,' says report

Bihar news: The oath-taking ceremony of Nitish Kumar and Tejashwi Yadav as Bihar's Chief Minister and Deputy Chief Minister, respectively, will take place at 2 pm on Wednesday, reports said on Tuesday.

TN National Desk

Updated Aug 9, 2022, 21:39 IST

Representative image

Photo : PTI

KEY HIGHLIGHTS

The swearing-in ceremony will be held inside Raj Bhavan
Sources in Nitish Kumar's JD(U) and Tejashwi Yadav's RJD said more ministers will be inducted into the Cabinet later
After splitting with the BJP-led NDA earlier in the day, Nitish Kumar will take oath as CM for the eighth time

New Delhi: A report said on Tuesday that Congress will likely receive four ministerial berths in the new government in Bihar after Nitish Kumar severed ties with Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

After resigning, Nitish Kumar talked to both Congress president Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi, news agency PTI mentioned sources as saying. In addition, he is reported to have thanked the Congress leadership for supporting the new government's formation.

Congress has also sought the post of Speaker of the Bihar Assembly along with the four ministerial berths, but Kumar is not interested in giving it to them, said sources.

In the 243-member Bihar Assembly, Congress has 19 MLAs, JD(U) 45, RJD 79, CPI(ML) 12, and CPI and CPI(M) each have two legislators. Jitan Ram Manjhi's Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM) has four MLAs in Bihar while the BJP has 77.

The House has one Independent MLA and one seat is vacant.

Madan Mohan Jha, the Bihar Congress president, and Bhakta Charan Das, the party's in-charge of Bihar affairs, were present at the meeting of Nitish Kumar, Tejashwi Yadav, and other leaders.

In Patna, all 19 Congress legislators attended a dinner meeting at the residence of the CLP leader.

However, the top Congress leadership in Delhi remained silent about the political development in Bihar.

In an earlier statement, Congress said it would join the non-BJP alliance in Bihar to strengthen secular forces.

"Ours is an ideological battle and we are not fighting for power. The Congress will support any non-BJP government and help strengthen secular forces," Congress general secretary Tariq Anwar earlier told PTI.

"Because Nitish Kumar is leaving the BJP and coming over, we will support him," he said, stressing that the Congress would take whatever steps were necessary to strengthen secular forces and defeat communal forces.

Jairam Ramesh, the general secretary of Congress, tweeted, "In March 2020, Modi sarkar postponed COVID-19 lockdown to engineer the fall of the Kamal Nath government in Madhya Pradesh. Now, it cuts short Parliament session knowing its coalition government in Bihar is going. What goes up must come down!"

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