Bharatiya Janata Party leader Vishnu Deo Sai will take oath as Chhattisgarh Chief Minister on December 13 at 3.30 pm. Sai hails from the influential Sahu (Teli) community which has a sizable presence in Durg, Raipur and Bilaspur divisions.
The Bharatiya Janata Party government in Chhattisgarh may have a deputy chief minister, senior leader Raman Singh said on Sunday ahead of a meeting of the newly elected MLAs in the state to elect their legislative party leader.
The BJP won 54 seats in the 90-member Assembly in the recently held polls, unseating the Bhupesh Baghel-led Congress government. The Congress ended with 35 seats, down from 68 it won in 2018.
Sai was on Sunday elected as leader of the BJP's legislative party during a meeting of 54 newly elected MLAs at Kushabhau Thakre Parisar, the party's state headquarters here.
Ahead of the meeting, senior party leader and former chief minister Raman Singh said deputy CM will also be appointed along with the others.
Though no such announcement was made in the legislative party meeting, there was speculation in local political circles that two deputy CMs might be appointed in the new BJP government.
The Chhattisgarh cabinet has a stipulated strength of 13 members, including CM, in the 90-member assembly.
The names of state unit chief Arun Sao, IAS-turned-politician OP Chaudhary, both from Other Backward Classes, and Vijay Sharma, an MLA from the general category, were doing the rounds in political circles. The OBCs account for around 45 per cent of the state's population.
