Riding to the Delhi Assembly on youth vote, the Aam Aadmi Party on Tuesday came out with a ‘young Cabinet’ to take charge of the affairs in the national Capital.
led by 45-year-old Arvind Kejriwal, the proposed Cabinet has 24-year-old Rakhi Birla as the youngest Minister, who made her way to the Assembly by defeating Congress heavyweight Raj Kumar Chauhan from Mangolpuri seat. She is the youngest Minister in the history of Delhi.
Apart from Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia, Girish Soni and Satyendra Jain are the other members of the Cabinet who are in their 40s.
While 41-year-old Manish Sisodia is the MlA from Patparganj in East Delhi, 49-year-old Satyendra Jain has been elected from Shakur Basti. Sisodia, who is understood to be the second in-command to Kejriwal, is expected to be given a key Ministry in the Government. Madipur MlA Girish Soni is also 49 years old.
The Cabinet has a young engineer Saurabh Bhardwaj, MlA from Greater Kailash and another IITian besides Kejriwal, Somnath Bharti who won the Malviya Nagar Assembly seat.
“I am humbled being appointed as a member of the Cabinet. I will fulfil my duty of serving the people and in a very approachable manner,” said 39-year-old Bharti who is also a law graduate. “I don’t know what department I will be allotted; that’s why I can’t say much right now,” said 34-year-old Bhardwaj, who is also an advocate.
While the outgoing Ministers of Congress belong to an average age group of 60, these young MlAs who will be soon holding Ministry portfolios are on an average 35 years old.
The announcement came a day after Kejriwal conveyed the decision of his party, which won 28 seats in the 70-member Assembly, to lieutenant-Governor Najeeb Jung to stake claim after the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) which had won 32 seats refused to form the Government due to lack of a majority.