Punjab CM gives more power to Malwa in state cabinet

With four more MLAs from Malwa region taking oath as ministers on Monday, its share has gone up from 50% to 60% in Punjab cabinet

With the induction of five new cabinet ministers, Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann has given more power to Malwa region that laid the foundation of the rise of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the state.

Of the newly inducted Punjab cabinet ministers, four — Aman Arora (Sunam), Fauja Singh Sarari (Guru Har Sahai), Chetan Singh Jouramajra (Samana) and Anmol Gagan Maan (Kharar) — are from Malwa. (Ravi Kumar/HT)

Of the newly inducted cabinet ministers, four — Aman Arora (MLA from Sunam), Fauja Singh Sarari (Guru Har Sahai), Chetan Singh Jouramajra (Samana) and Anmol Gagan Maan (Kharar) — are from Malwa. The fifth, Dr Inderbir Singh Nijjar, who represents Amritsar South, is from Majha.

The expansion, which comes just days after the party lost the Sangrur Lok Sa8bha byelection in Malwa, has taken the total number of ministers from the region to nine in the 15-member cabinet, including the chief minister (CM).

Region accounts for AAP’s 72% seat tally

Malwa is the biggest of the three regions in Punjab and accounts for 69 of the 117 seats in the state assembly. The AAP had made a near clean sweep in Malwa and won 66, ie 72%, of its total tally of 92 seats there. It got 16 of the 25 seats in Majha and another 10 out of 23 seats in Doaba.

When Mann formed his government with 10 ministers in March this year, he took five from Malwa, four from Majha and one from Doaba. Though Malwa had got the lion’s share in the cabinet, there were several MLAs, including some senior ones, who felt left out. However, health minister Dr Vijay Singla, one of the five ministers from Malwa, was later dropped from the cabinet over allegations of corruption.

Ashutosh Kumar, professor of political science at Panjab University, Chandigarh, said that as historical regions have become political regions, each having own electoral specificities, the effort to strike regional balance makes sense given the fact that Malwa is the strong bastion of the AAP since 2014.

AAP state chief spokesperson Malvinder Singh Kang, however, said that there were no regional and religious considerations in the expansion of the state cabinet. “The new ministers have been inducted strictly on the basis of their competencies and ability to work for people of the state,” he said.

First-timers get preference again

The expansion also saw the CM induct four more first-time lawmakers in his cabinet, besides Aman Arora who is a two-time MLA from Sunam. The names of other senior MLAs, including Sarvjit Kaur Manuke, Budh Ram and Baljinder Kaur, were also doing the rounds as frontrunners for cabinet berths, but they did not make it to the podium.

At the time of cabinet formation, too, eight of the 10 ministers included by the CM in his team were first-timers.