Nitish allocates portfolios to 26 ministers in cabinet

A day after taking oath as the Bihar Chief Minister for the 1Oth time, Nitish Kumar allocated portfolios to the 26 ministers in his new cabinet.

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The Council of Ministers includes representatives from the Janata Dal-United, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Hindustani Awam Morcha, Lok Janshakti Party-Ram Vilas, and the Rashtriya Lok Morcha.

Nitish has retained the General Administration, Election Monitoring, and several other important departments.

In a major shift, the crucial Home Department, previously held by Nitish, has been given to Deputy Chief Minister Samrat Choudhary.

With this change, policing and law-and-order responsibilities now fall directly under Deputy CM Choudhary.

He had earlier handled the Finance and Commercial Tax departments.

The second Deputy Chief Minister, Vijay Kumar Sinha, will oversee the Revenue, Land Reforms, and Mining Ministries -- portfolios he handled in the previous NDA government as well.

Mangal Pandey retains the Health Ministry and has also been allotted the Law Department.

Dilip Jaiswal, the State BJP President and MLC, has been given the Industries Department, previously held by Nitish Mishra.