BHOPAL: The work of five departments has stopped in the absence of ministers after the by-elections.
Two ministers Govind Rajput and Tulsi Silawat resigned from the cabinet during the by-elections.
Three other ministers Aidal Singh Kansana, Imarti Devi and Girraj Dandotia also resigned from the ministry, since they had lost the by-polls.
The revenue, transport, women and child development, public health engineering and water resources departments are with the Chief Minister.
This has happened because of the resignation of five ministers.
As those departments are without ministers, only routine work is done there. There is no way to take decision on policy matter.
The resignation of Imarti and that of Kansana have yet to be accepted. But the officials of the departments both have headed have stopped sending them files.
There are no in charge ministers of those five important departments.
Chouhan wants that distribution of those departments should be done only after the proposed cabinet expansion.
He does not stop the work of any of the five departments. Yet the absence of ministers has affected their work.
According to sources, there a tug-of-war among the legislators over the departments from where the ministers resigned after losing by-elections.
As the resignations of the three ministers have yet to be accepted, all of them are still treated as heads of their respective departments that they quit.
They have the rights to deal with any file, since they are still ministers. The officials have, however, given a wide berth to sending files to those ministers.
The officers fear that Kansana, Imarti and Dandotia may not be ministers in coming days.
As soon as the BJP government was formed, the lockdown caused by the corona pandemic began. Therefore, many departments were without ministers. After swearing-in of Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, cabinet formation delayed for a month because of the pandemic.
Only five ministers were sworn in at the time of ministry formation. Therefore, ministry expansion was done after two months of the swearing-in of five ministers.
Even after four months of cabinet expansion, five departments are without ministers.
Chouhan has said people will come to know about the cabinet expansion whenever it takes place. He has refuted news about the ministry expansion anytime soon.
