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Parkash Singh Badal was today sworn in as the Chief Minister of Punjab for a record fifth time. His son and Shiromani Akali Dal president Sukhbir Singh Badal took oath as the Deputy Chief Minister.
Sixteen other legislators took the oath of office and secrecy and allegiance to the Constitution as Cabinet ministers to run the Punjab Government for the next five years.
With this, Badal becomes the oldest and the most experienced Chief Minister in the country. He will be the leader of the House in the 14th Punjab Vidhan Sabha that will meet for the first time on March 19.
He was the first to take oath at the Banda Bahadur Memorial at Chappar Chiri, 15 km from Chandigarh, by Punjab Governor Shivraj Patil.
The 18-member Punjab Cabinet has 14 ministers from the SAD and four from the BJP, its pre-poll alliance partner.
The swearing-in ceremony was attended by thousands of supporters and political leaders from across the country. Leaders from Sant Samaj, which was part of the SAD-BJP alliance, were given special attention and were made to sit on a stage.
The Cabinet is a single-tier one with all ministers being granted Cabinet rank. Among these 18, four ministers each are from Majha and Doaba regions. while Malwa has 10 ministers, including the Chief Minister and the Deputy Chief Minister. The distribution of ministries is based on the region-wise proportion of constituencies in the state.
The ministers from Majha who were sworn in today are Adesh Partap Kairon, Bikramjit Singh Majithia, Anil Joshi and Gulzar Singh Ranike. Doaba is represented by Jagir Kaur, Ajit Singh Kohar, Sarwan Singh Phillaur and Bhagat Chuni Lal.
