Vijay Rupani to take oath as Gujarat CM today

Ahmedabad: The new Gujarat government led by chief minister-elect Vijay Rupani will take the oath of office in Gand-hinagar on Tuesday in the presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP president Amit Shah.

Along with Mr Rupani and his deputy Nitin Patel, six to nine Cabinet and around 15 ministers of state are expected to be sworn-in by governor O.P. Kohli.

Chief ministers of all BJP-ruled states and those governed by NDA allies are also expected to attend the ceremony, Gujarat BJP chief Jitu Vaghani said.

He said that several Union ministers and senior leaders of the party have also been invited, besides saints and religious leaders of different faiths.

“Most of the senior leaders who were ministers in the last governm-ent are expected to make it to the new ministry,” said a party leader.

The names doing the rounds for Cabinet ber-ths are Bhupendrasinh Chudasama, Kaushik Patel, Ganpat Vasava, Dilip Thakor, Babubhai Bokhiria and Pradeep-sinh Jadeja, he said.

Six ministers in the previous government lost in the polls. Asse-mbly Speaker Ramanlal Vora too bit the dust.

With 99 MLAs, the BJP has a simple majority in the 182-member Assembly, 16 less than its 2012 tally of 115.

The Opposition Congress, which had won 61 seats in 2012, managed to increase its tally to 77.