The Indian government on Tuesday announced the transfers of as many as seven governors ahead of the much-talked-about cabinet reshuffle. The government also released one of its key cabinet ministers, Thawarchand Gehlot, to become the governor of Karnataka.
A statement from the office of the President of India said that while Gehlot will take charge of Karnataka governor, PS Sreedharan Pillai, presently the governor of Mizoram, has been transferred and appointed as the governor of Goa. In other changes, Satyadev Narayan Arya, governor of Haryana, is transferred to Tripura, Ramesh Bais transferred from Tripura to Jharkhand, Bandaru Dattatraya shifted from Himachal Pradesh Haryana, Hari Babu Kambhampati appointed as governor of Mizoram, Mangubhai Chhaganbhai Patel named governor of Madhya Pradesh and Rajendra Vishwanath Arlekar named as governor of Himachal Pradesh.
Gehlot’s release from the cabinet ministry assumes significance since he held the key portfolio of Social Justice and Empowerment in the government headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He was also the BJP’s leader in the Rajya Sabha.
The announcement of fresh appointments of governors was made ahead of the key cabinet reshuffle in the Modi government. There are speculations that as many as eight new faces would be included in the cabinet. The names doing the rounds are Jyotiraditya Scindia, who joined the BJP from the Congress, Sushil Kumar Modi from Bihar, Sarbananda Sonowal, Tirath Singh Rawat and Narayan Rane.
Sushil Kumar Modi was Bihar’s deputy chief minister but was dropped from the post after the BJP-JDU formed the government again in 2020. Tirath Singh Rawat was recently removed from the post of Uttarakhand chief minister. Sonowal was replaced by Himanta Biswa Sarma as the Assam’s chief minister after the BJP won a second term in May this year.
Narayan Rane, a former Shiv Sena and Congress leader, is tall BJP politician from Maharashtra.
