NDA appoints five new governors

Ram Naik, O P Kohli, Balramji Dass Tandon, Keshari Nath Tripathi and P B Acharya are now in gubernatorial post

President Pranab Mukherjee on Monday appointed governors to five states.

This is the first set of new gubernatorial appointments made during the tenure of the Narendra Modi-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government. The issue of gubernatorial appointments has become contentious ever since the home ministry nudged some of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government appointees to quit.

Mukherjee appointed former Union minister and veteran Maharashtra Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Ram Naik as the governor of Uttar Pradesh, Om Prakash Kohli as the governor of Gujarat, Punjab BJP leader Balramji Dass Tandon as the new governor of Chhattisgarh and Keshari Nath Tripathi as the new governor of West Bengal. Padmanabha Balkrishna Acharya has been appointed the new governor of Nagaland. He has also been given the additional charge of Tripura.

NEW GOVERNORS
NDA govt’s first set of gubernatorial appointments

Gujarat: Om Prakash Kohli
Chhattisgarh: Balramji Dass Tandon
West Bengal: Keshari Nath Tripathi
Nagaland and additional charge of Tripura: Padmanabha Balkrishna Acharya

Naik, 80, fills the vacancy at the Lucknow Raj Bhavan after Banwari Lal Joshi, a Gandhi family confidante, retired in mid-June at the completion of his five-year term. Naik was the petroleum minister from October 1999 to May 2004 during the Atal Bihari Vajpayee-led NDA government.

Kohli is yet another veteran BJP leader and a former president of the Delhi unit. He comes in place of Kamla Beniwal. Kohli, 78, has been a Rajya Sabha member from 1994 to 2000. A former president of the party’s student wing Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, he also headed the Delhi University Teachers’ Association. On July 6, the Centre transferred Beniwal from Gujarat to Mizoram for the remainder of her term until November this year. Beniwal was one of the few UPA-appointed governors that the Centre was keen, should quit.

Tandon, a former Punjab minister, will be the new governor of Chhattisgarh. The slot fell vacant after retired bureaucrat Shekhar Dutt was nudged by the Centre to resign. Tandon, 87, was one of the founders of the Bharatiya Jan Sangh in 1951. He was the deputy chief minister of Punjab in 1969 and later also served as cabinet minister in Prakash Singh Badal-headed governments. Tandon is a six-time MLA. In 2012, he criticised the Badal government’s decision to supply free power to farmers. Tandon’s son Sanjay heads the Chandigarh unit of the BJP.

Another BJP veteran Keshari Nath Tripathi, a former Speaker of the UP assembly, will be the new governor of Bengal. Eighty-year-old Tripathi is a five-time MLA and a published poet. He replaces former national security adviser M K Narayanan, who quit a few days after being questioned by the CBI in the alleged scam in the procurement of AgustaWestland VVIP chopper procurement. Apart from Narayanan, Andhra Pradesh governor E S L Narasimhan and Goa governor B V Wanchoo have also been questioned. Wanchoo quit earlier this month. Tripathi is most famously remembered for his role in 2003 when the Mulayam Singh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party formed a minority government in Lucknow.

Padmanabha Acharya, a member of the BJP working group on the northeast region and co-convener of Overseas Friends of the BJP, will be the new Nagaland governor. He replaces former CBI director Ashwani Kumar, who, the BJP-led NDA government at the Centre was keen, should quit, given his alleged proximity to the Congress. It was during Kumar’s tenure in the CBI that the agency had investigated cases of “saffron terror” with some vigour. Kumar quit late last month.

Acharya will also hold the additional charge of Tripura for the time being, a vacancy having arisen at the Agartala Raj Bhavan after Devanand Konwar retired on completion of his term last month.

Earlier this month, the Centre had transferred Mizoram governor and veteran Congress leader Vakkom Purushothaman from Mizoram Raj Bhavan to Nagaland but the latter resigned, terming it an insult since he wasn’t consulted. A President House communiqué released on Monday stated the President has accepted Purushothaman’s resignation and asked Acharya to discharge the functions of Tripura governor until regular arrangements are made.

Currently, there are vacancies in the Raj Bhavans of Goa and Karnataka. Karnataka governor H R Bhardwaj retired last month while Goa governor Wanchoo quit a day after being questioned by the CBI. The president sacked Puducherry lieutenant governor Virendra Kataria late last week. The BJP wants all 'political appointees' of the UPA government among the governors to quit. Some have been nudged to resign, while those who refused have been transferred. The party, in the cases of some others like Punjab governor Shivraj Patil, seems willing to wait out till they complete their terms.