The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which secured a decisive mandate in the 294-member West Bengal Assembly by winning 207 seats, formally assumed office on Saturday as Suvendu Adhikari took oath as the state’s first BJP chief minister. Alongside him, five BJP legislators were sworn in as Cabinet ministers in the newly constituted government.
The swearing-in ceremony, held at Brigade Parade Ground, marked the first time a Bengal chief minister has taken oath at the historic venue. The event was attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union ministers Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh, J. P. Nadda and Dharmendra Pradhan, along with several BJP chief ministers including Himanta Biswa Sarma, Yogi Adityanath, Pushkar Singh Dhami, Manik Saha, Mohan Yadav, Bhajan Lal Sharma and Rekha Gupta.
R. N. Ravi administered the oath of office and secrecy to the chief minister and the newly inducted ministers.
Adhikari registered emphatic victories from both Nandigram and Bhabanipur in the recently concluded Assembly elections. His win in Bhabanipur carried added political significance as he defeated outgoing chief minister Mamata Banerjee, while in Nandigram he defeated TMC candidate Pabitra Kar by a substantial margin.
The ministers sworn in with Adhikari were Dilip Ghosh, Agnimitra Paul, Ashok Kirtania, Kshudiram Tudu and Nisith Pramanik. media reports indicate that the Cabinet would be expanded in the coming days, with room for several more inductions in the 44-member council permitted under constitutional norms.
West Bengal also recorded its highest voter turnout since Independence during the Assembly elections. Phase I polling stood at 93.19 per cent, while Phase II recorded 91.66 per cent, taking the combined turnout to 92.47 per cent.
Five Ministers Inducted Into Bengal Cabinet:
Dilip Ghosh
Senior BJP leader Dilip Ghosh was among the prominent faces inducted into the Cabinet. The former West Bengal BJP president won the Kharagpur Assembly constituency by a margin exceeding 30,000 votes.
Widely credited with expanding the BJP’s organisational base in Bengal, Ghosh headed the party’s state unit between 2015 and 2021, a phase during which the BJP emerged as a formidable opposition force in the state. Before entering electoral politics, he worked as a full-time Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh pracharak and later served as Member of Parliament from Medinipur after winning the 2019 Lok Sabha election.
Agnimitra Paul
Fashion designer-turned-politician Agnimitra Paul joined the Cabinet after winning the Asansol Dakshin seat by more than 40,000 votes. She is currently the lone woman minister in the BJP-led Bengal Cabinet.
Paul entered politics in 2019 and later emerged as one of the BJP’s prominent women leaders in West Bengal. She previously served as president of the BJP Mahila Morcha in the state and currently holds the post of state vice-president.
Before entering politics, Paul ran her fashion label “Inga” and designed outfits for actors including Sridevi and Hema Malini.
Ashok Kirtania
Ashok Kirtania, who retained Bangaon Uttar with a victory margin of over 40,000 votes, was also sworn in as minister. His inclusion is being viewed as strategically important for the Matua community, which remains politically influential across several districts of West Bengal.
A businessman by profession, Kirtania has remained active in regional organisational politics and had also won the constituency in the 2021 Assembly polls.
Kshudiram Tudu
First-time MLA Kshudiram Tudu, representing the tribal-dominated Ranibandh (ST) constituency in Bankura district, also found a place in the Cabinet.
A former school teacher, Tudu has been associated with the BJP’s outreach among tribal communities in the Jangalmahal region and has actively raised issues related to tribal welfare and rural development.
Nisith Pramanik
Former Union Minister of State Nisith Pramanik was inducted into the ministry after securing a commanding win from the Mathabhanga Assembly constituency by more than 57,000 votes.
Considered an influential BJP leader in North Bengal, Pramanik previously served in the Union ministries of Home Affairs and Youth Affairs and Sports. Before joining the BJP in 2019, he was associated with the Trinamool Congress. He later won the Cooch Behar Lok Sabha seat and became one of the youngest ministers in the Narendra Modi-led Union government during the 2021 Cabinet reshuffle at the age of 35. |
