With names of several senior leaders like Ram Madhav, l Jain, Saroj Pandey and P Muralidhar Rao missing from the new list of national office bearers announced by the Bharatiya Janata Party chief JP Nadda on Saturday, speculation is rife that an imminent union cabinet reshuffle is on the cards.
Several other senior leaders like Uma Bharati, Om Mathur, Prabhat Jha, Vinay Sahastrabhuddhe, Shyam Jaju and Avinash Rai Khanna are also missing from the new national team.
Sources said a Cabinet expansion could take place in the next few weeks or after the Bihar Assembly polls. A few of these leaders are likely to be accommodated in the new cabinet.
Party sources said that leaders from several key states like West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana are expected to be accommodated in the expansion as the BJP aims to grow in these states in the future.
It is also learnt that Prime Minister Narendra Modi may also rejig the portfolios of several of his ministers. Currently, several ministers have been burdened with multiple portfolios. This may change and some of these may be allocated to the newly inducted ministers, sources added.
The much awaited cabinet reshuffle would be the first such rejig of the Narendra Modi cabinet after it was voted back to power in 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
( With inputs from ANI )
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