Ahmedabad:
Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi expanded his council of ministers to 27, with the induction of six ministers of state on Wednesday.
Liladhar Vaghela (Deodhar), Ishvarbhai Patel (Ankleshvar), Ranjit Gilatwala (Surat), Jitu Sukhadia (Vadodara), Jaydratsinh Parmar (Halol) and Mohan Kunderia (Tankara) were sworn in by Governor Dr Kamala at a simple ceremony on the lawns of the Raj Bhavan.
Patel and Parmar were already parliamentary secretaries.
This is the second cabinet expansion in six months and comes less than a week after Modi inducted eight party members as chairpersons of state public sector boards and corporations.
With this expansion, Modi reached the highest ministerial strength of 27 permitted for Gujarat.