President Pranab Mukherjee and PM Modi with the newly sworn-in ministers at the Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi. (Press Trut of India)
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has inducted 21 new ministers, four of them of cabinet rank including ex-Goa chief minister Manohar Parrikar, in the first expansion of his council of ministers.
Here are the latest developments in this story:
PM Modi will meet his expanded cabinet on Monday evening, followed by a meeting with the entire council of ministers, news agency Press Trust of India said.
The Shiv Sena stayed away from the oath ceremony. The Rashtrapati Bhawan noted in an official statement that the Shiv Sena's Anil Desai "could not be administered the oath of office and secrecy as he was not available for the purpose."
Suresh Prabhu, who resigned from the Shiv Sena and joined the BJP on Sunday, will also be a Cabinet minister. The Shiv Sena had not nominated him and was miffed that its official nominee Anil Desai was not offered a Cabinet rank. "We chose not have Anil Desai inducted at the Centre due to the uncertainty at the state level," Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray told media personnel in Mumbai today evening.
BJP organisation man, the hitherto low-profile JP Nadda, makes his debut as minister, straight with a Cabinet rank. Choudhury Birendra Singh from Haryana, recently brought in from the Congress is also a cabinet minister.
Bihar's Rajiv Pratap Rudy took oath as one of three ministers of state with independent charge. A prominent BJP leader and former minister, he was seen as a surprise omission when the first set of PM Modi's ministers took oath in May.
New state of Telangana gets a representative; the BJP's Bandaru Dattatreya is a new Minister of State with independent charge. As is Mahesh Sharma from UP.
Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, a prominent Muslim face in the BJP and former minister, will be a Minister of State or junior minister.
Bihar, which votes for a new assembly next year, has strategically been given three new ministers and now has eight in the Modi government. Apart from Mr Rudy, Ram Kripal Yadav, imported by the BJP recently from Lalu Prasad's party and Giriraj Singh, a first-time MP known most for his controversial comments, have been sworn in as Ministers of State.
Olympian shooter and ex-Army man Rajyavardhan Rathore wore a colourful safa and a bandhgala, as he took oath as minister of state. He was followed by actor-turned-politician Babul Supriyo, who pulled off a surprise win for the BJP in West Bengal in the national elections this year.
There are four new Cabinet ministers, three Ministers of State with independent charge and 14 junior ministers. The Modi cabinet now has 66 ministers. The Congress-led UPA government had 73 ministers in May this year, when it was voted out in the national elections.
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