After oath-taking ceremony, the chief minister Yogi Adityanath holds his first cabinet meeting

LUCKNOW: Yogi Adityanath took oath as the 21st chief minister of Uttar Pradesh here on Sunday, along with deputy chief ministers Keshav Prasad Maurya and Dinesh Sharma, 22 cabinet ministers, nine ministers of state (independent charge) and 13 ministers of state.

Soon after the oath-taking ceremony, the chief minister held his first cabinet meeting. He said the composition of his council of ministers is an indication that his government is committed to “sabka saath, sabka vikas”.

Yogi’s team has representation from all castes, though Brahmins and OBCs are present in conspicuous numbers in the cabinet. Mohsin Raza — minister of state — is the only Muslim face in the council of ministers.

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Rita Joshi is the only woman in Yogi’s cabinet. Veteran BJP MLAs Suresh Khanna (Shahjahanpur) and Satish Mahana (Marajpur) were also administered oath by Governor Ram Naik.

Surya Pratap Shahi was a minister in the last BJP government that ruled till 2002 in UP. Seven of the 22 cabinet ministers are those who had defected from other parties to BJP after the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.

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These are Swami Prasad Maurya (from BSP), Rita Bahuguna Joshi (Congress), Dara Singh Chouhan (BSP), SPS Baghel (SP), Brajesh Pathak (BSP), Laxminarayan Chaudhary (BSP) and Nand Gopal Gupta Nandi (Congress). Two national secretaries — Srikant Sharma and Siddarthnath Singh — have also been given cabinet rank.