Bihar Cabinet expansion: The new ministers in the Samrat Choudhary government take oath.
Ministers from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Janata Dal (United) and other National Democratic Alliance (NDA) partners were sworn in on Thursday at Gandhi Maidan in Patna during a major expansion of the Samrat Choudhary-led Bihar cabinet.
Among those who took oath as ministers were Vijay Kumar Sinha, Shrawon Kumar, Nishant Kumar, Dilip Jaiswal, Leshi Singh, Ram Kripal Yadav, Nitish Mishra, Damodar Rawat, Sanjay Singh ‘Tiger’, Ashok Chaudhary, Bhagwan Singh Kushwaha, Arun Shankar Prasad, Madan Sahni, Santosh Kumar Suman, Rama Nishad, Ratnesh Sada, Kumar Shailendra, Sheila Kumari, Kedar Prasad Gupta, Lakhendra Kumar Roshan, Sunil Kumar, Shreyashi Singh, Mohd Zama Khan, Nandkishor Ram, Sailesh Kumar, Pramod Kumar, Shweta Gupta, Mithilesh Tiwari, Ramchandra Prasad, Sanjay Kumar Singh, Sanjay Kumar, and Deepak Prakash.
Nishant Kumar is former CM Nitish Kumar’s son.
Governor Lt Gen Syed Ata Hasnain (Retd) administered the oath of office to the ministers.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, Bihar Chief Minister Samrat Choudhary and a host of senior leaders attended the ceremony.
The cabinet expansion comes months after the NDA’s sweeping victory in Bihar, where the alliance secured 202 seats in the 243-member assembly. The 2025 election result handed the NDA a dominant three-fourths majority, while the Mahagathbandhan was restricted to just 35 seats.
Within the ruling alliance, the BJP emerged with 89 seats, while the JD(U) won 85. The Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) secured 19 seats, Hindustani Awam Morcha (Secular) bagged five, and the Rashtriya Lok Morcha won four.
On the opposition side, the Rashtriya Janata Dal won 25 seats, followed by the Congress with six and CPI(ML)(L) with two. The Indian Inclusive Party and CPI(M) won one seat each, while the All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen secured five seats and the BSP managed one.
Nitish Kumar was sworn in as Chief Minister for a record 10th term on November 20 in the presence of Prime Minister Modi and other senior NDA leaders.
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Nitish Kumar resigned from the Bihar Legislative Council on March 30 as he prepared to move to the Rajya Sabha.
Samrat Choudhary subsequently took oath as Bihar’s first BJP Chief Minister, bringing an end to Nitish Kumar’s 21-year stint at the helm of the state.
To maintain coalition balance, senior JD(U) leaders Vijay Kumar Choudhary and Bijendra Prasad Yadav were sworn in as Deputy Chief Ministers.
Earlier, Samrat Choudhary won the trust vote in the 243-member Bihar Assembly with ease, underlining the NDA’s unity and formally completing the political transition following Nitish Kumar’s resignation as Chief Minister.
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The confidence motion was comfortably passed with the backing of the BJP, JD(U) and other NDA allies, reaffirming their support for Samrat Choudhary’s leadership.