9 new ministers to be inducted in Amarinder's cabinet

CHANDIGARH: Congress has finalised names of nine legislators who will be sworn-in as cabinet ministers in Punjab on Saturday. The decision was taken after a meeting between chief minister Capt Amarinder Singh and Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Friday.

The new cabinet ministers include Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa, Sukhbinder Singh Sarkaria, Vijay Inder Singla, Bharat Bhushan Ashu, Sunder Shyam Arora, OP Soni, Rana Gurmit Sodhi, Gurpreet Kangar and Balbir Sidhu.

Punjab Congress president Sunil Jakhar, party’s incharge of Punjab affairs Asha Kumari and co-incharge Harish Choudhary were also present in the meeting.

Meanwhile, ministers of State Razia Sultana and Aruna Chaudhary will be elevated to the rank of cabinet minister. This decision too was taken during meeting between Amarinder and Rahul.

The swearing-in ceremony will be held at 6 pm on Saturday, said an official spokesperson.

On Thursday too, the proposed cabinet expansion was discussed by Amarinder with Rahul in New Delhi on Thursday but it was decided to hold back any announcement as the party wanted to get its arithmetic right ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.