Pinarayi Vijayan cabinet to have CPI (M) new faces; Shailaja dropped

CPI(M) veteran Pinarayi Vijayan was on Tuesday elected its Parliamentary party leader, paving the way for his successive stint as Chief Minister of Kerala. Health minister in the outgoing Assembly, K K Shailaja, does not find a place in the new cabinet which has 11 new faces from CPI (M).

MV Govindan , K Radhakrishnan, KN Balagopal, P Rajeev, VN Vasavan, Saji Cherian, V Sivankutty, Mohammed Riyaz , R Bindu, Veena George and V Abdul Rahman. MB Rajesh was nominated for the post of Assembly Speaker.

The exclusion of KK Shailaja, popularly known as Shailaja Teacher, who earned a lof of praise for her handling of the Covid-19 pandemic and the 2018 Nipah outbreak, raised a lot of eyebrows. She has been made the party whip.


The state committee of the Marxist party, chaired by senior leader Elamaram Kareem, met at its headquarters AKG Centre and elected Vijayan to lead the party, a CPI(M) statement said.

Vijayan had scripted history in the April 6 Assembly polls by leading the Left front to a consecutive term, bucking the over four-decade-old trend in the state of the people choosing between the Left and Congress-led alliances alternately.