Manmohan Singh's 78-member council of ministers finalised

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's new government took shape today with a 78-member council of ministers, including 33 cabinet ministers and 45 ministers of state, being named after three days of intense negotiations.Manmohan's team part-2

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's new government took shape on Wednesday with a 78-member council of ministers, including 33 cabinet ministers and 45 ministers of state, being named after three days of intense negotiations.

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The new government's 78-strong council of ministers makes place for 19 allies of the second United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government - seven each from the DMK and the Trinamool Congress, three from the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and one each from the Muslim League and the National Conference.

The outgoing government also had 78 ministers, with 23 allies.

While 19 cabinet ministers, including Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee and NCP's Sharad Pawar, had been sworn in last week Friday, 14 more will take oath Thursday morning along with 45 ministers of state, seven of whom will hold independent charge.

The new cabinet ministers include three former chief ministers - Virbhadra Singh (Himachal Pradesh), Vilasrao Deshmukh (Maharashtra) and Farooq Abdullah (Jammu and Kashmir). Three leaders from the DMK, the Congress' ally in Tamil Nadu, also find place - Dayanidhi Maran, M.K. Azhagari and A. Raja.

The ministers of state with independent charge are the NCP's Praful Patel and the Congress' Prithviraj Chavan, Sriprakash Jaiswal, Salman Khurshid, Jairam Ramesh, Krishna Tirath and Dinsha Patel.

The 38 other ministers of state are E. Ahamed, V. Narayanasamy, Srikant Jena, Mullappally Ramachandran, D. Purandeswari, Panabaka Lakshmi, Ajay Maken, K.H. Muniyappa, Namo Narain Meena, Jyotiraditya Scindia, Jitin Prasad, A. Sai Prathap, Gurudas Kamat, M.M. Pallam Raju, Mahadev Khandela, Harish Rawat, K.V. Thomas, Saugata Ray, Dinesh Trivedi, Sisir Adhikari, Sultan Ahmed, Mukul Roy, Mohan Jatua, S.S. Palanimanickam, D. Napoleon, S. Jagathrakshakan, S. Gandhiselvan, Preneet Kaur, Sachin Pilot, Shashi Tharoor, Bharatsinh Solanki, Tusharbhai Chaudhary, Arun Yadav, Prateek Prakashbapu Patil, R.P.N. Singh, Vincent Pala, Pradeep Jain and Agatha Sangma.

Of these, E. Ahamed is from the Muslim League; the Trinamool Congress is represented by Saugata Ray, Dinesh Trivedi, Sisir Adhikari, Sultan Ahmed, Mukul Roy and Mohan Jatua; the DMK's four-member brigade comprises S.S. Palanimanickam, D. Napoleon, S. Jagathrakshakan, and S. Gandhiselvan; the NCP's lone member is Agatha Sangma.

The notable omissions in the list of cabinet ministers are H.R. Bhardwaj, Shivraj Patil, Arjun Singh, Sis Ram Ola and P.R. Kyndiah.

In the last council of ministers, there were 30 cabinet ministers, including eight allies; ministers of state with independent charge comprised seven from the Congress and one from the NCP; besides, there were 26 Congress leaders and 14 from the various allies amongst the 40 ministers of state.