Speculation abuzz aboutcabinet expansion in U'khand

Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat recently threw hints about a possible cabinet expansion in Uttarakhand, raising the hopes once again of nearly two dozen aspirants waiting in the wings for a ministerial berth.

A ten-member cabinet was sworn in when the BJP swept to power in the state in February 2017, even though it can have a maximum of 12 members.

While two berths in the cabinet have always been vacant since the very outset, the number of vacant seats rose to three in June lastyear when Parliamentary Affairs Minister Prakash Pant died battling cancer.

Pant's sudden demise triggered a buzz of speculation about the cabinet vacancies being filled but it died out soon as Urban Development Minister Madan Kaushik was given additional charge of Parliamentary Affairs and Finance, the twin portfolios held by Pant.

However, the buzz of speculation started all over again when the Chief Minister, on the sidelines of a function here, recently said that the need to fill the cabinet vacancies is being felt as each minister is overburdened with the charge of a number of departments.

Nearly two dozen names are doing the rounds as contenders for the three vacancies in the state cabinet.

The claims of five MLAs who have been ministers in the past -- Harbans Kapoor, Bishan Singh Chufal, Banshidhar Bhagat, Khajan Das and Balwant Singh Bhauryal -- are being considered strong as they have the advantage of experience.

There are at least 20 others who have been MLAs more than once and their claim on the cabinet vacancies is also considered strong. Prominent among these names are Munna Singh Chauhan, Surendra Singh Jeena, Harbhajan Singh Cheema, Pushkar Singh Dhami and Mahendra Bhatt.

Regional balance is going to be a deciding factor if all the three vacancies are filled, party sources said.

With six out of a total of nine ministers in the Trivendra Singh Rawat cabinet being from Garhwal, it is very likely that the claim of MLAs representing the Kumaon region will carry more weight, they said.

If all three cabinet vacancies are filled two would most probably go to Kumaon and one to Garhwal for the sake of striking a regional balance, the sources said.