A last minute move to assuage upset senior leaders, their groups of influence and balancing of caste equations is likely in poll-bound Madhya Pradesh with indications of a cabinet expansion of the Shivraj Singh Chouhan-led BJP government getting clearer.
According to party sources, “there are 90 per cent chances of a cabinet expansion within a day or two.” There are currently four vacant berths in the Chouhan cabinet that can have maximum 35 members including the chief minister.
The new ministers, if inducted, are likely to get just about one-and-a-half months to work as polls are likely in the state in November this year.
Chouhan met Governor Mangubhai Patel late on Tuesday evening, stirring the speculations of an imminent cabinet expansion, though the official line was that it was a courtesy meeting.
On Wednesday, BJP state chief V.D. Sharma said that cabinet expansion was a discretion of the chief minister and if it is done, it will come to fore.
Names of ex-minister Rajendra Shukla, a Brahmin leader of influence from Rewa seat in the crucial Vindhya region, and Gaurishankar Bisen, an OBC leader from tribal-dominated Balaghat in Mahakoshal region, are among the most possible names to be included in the cabinet, sources said.
Other names that are making the rounds include Pritam Lodhi, a relative of former Chief Minister Uma Bharti from Shivpuri district. However, Lodhi is not an MLA but wields considerable support among the OBC voters. He has a sweet-sour relation with the party and has been recently reinducted after a suspension last year.
Ex-minister Ajay Vishnoi from Jabalpur, who has off and on shown his anger at being left out of cabinet openly, might also make a cut.
Other OBC leaders Rahul Lodhi, a nephew of Uma Bharti and first-time MLA from Khargapur in the important Bundelkhand region, and Jalam Singh Patel, ex-minister and brother of union minister Prahlad Singh Patel from Narsinghpur in the Mahakoshal region, are also under consideration for cabinet berths, sources said.
The name of Sulochana Rawat, a tribal BJP MLA from Jobat in Alirajpur district and a former Congress minister, is also in circulation among the possible faces. Rawat had snatched the Jobat seat from Congress in November 2021 by-polls after joining the BJP just ahead of the elections.
Sources said the decision to expand the cabinet was taken after a feedback by the state poll in-charge Bhupender Yadav during recent visit of Union Home Minister Amit Shah that several senior leaders and their supporters were upset over not being included in the cabinet.
There has been no expansion of the Shivraj Singh Chouhan cabinet in Madhya Pradesh after the induction of 28 ministers in July 2020. The previous expansion came more than three months after a BJP government was formed following a rebellion of about two dozen Congress MLAs led by Union Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia. Five ministers had been inducted initially and the cabinet size had gone up to 34 including the chief minister, with just one slot remaining vacant.
During the November 2020 bypolls, three of the ministers from the Scindia camp had lost and these berths had fallen vacant but there was no cabinet expansion for the past three years. Since the Congress rebels had to be adjusted in the cabinet, many senior leaders were left out.
CM Chouhan has been known to make a final cabinet reshuffle a few months short of assembly polls during the past three times. Therefore there was expectation among the senior ‘left-out’ leaders that they might get a berth during the last phase of government’s tenure. As the election dates drew closer and no indications of expansion came, the restlessness of the leaders had been growing.
