Shivraj to expand cabinet to placate sulking BJP leaders

In an apparent bid to placate senior BJP leaders ahead of the forthcoming assembly poll, which are due to be held in November/December this year, in the state, Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan has decided to expand his cabinet.

According to the sources in the BJP, four new ministers might be inducted into the MP cabinet in the next few days.

Chauhan, who had a meeting with MP governor Mangubhai Patel on Tuesday evening, was likely to set the caste equations right before the assembly poll and could induct Rajendra Shukla, Gauri Shankar Bisen and two more in his ministry, sources said.

A maximum of four ministers could be included in the MP ministry.

Sources said that the decision to expand the cabinet at a time when the next assembly poll was barely four months away was taken after feedback received by union minister Amit Shah that some senior leaders of the party were sulking over their non-inclusion in the MP cabinet.

The party has been facing dissension among a section of its leaders after the announcement of the first list of assembly poll nominees. Around half a dozen senior leaders were reportedly very upset after being denied nomination.

The supporters of union minister Jyotiraditya Scindia were especially angry as many of them who had quit Congress and sided with Scindia, when the latter had rebelled in 2021 and walked out of the party with 20 MLAs leading to the fall of the then Kamalnath government, were also denied nominations from their strongholds.

A few Scindia loyalists, including Samandar Patel, had recently re-joined the Congress after he was denied ticket by the BJP.

Sources said that a few more BJP leaders could switch loyalties ahead of the assembly poll and the cabinet expansion was aimed at preventing the same.