With assembly polls knocking the doors, the Bharatiya Janata Party government in Uttar Pradesh led by Yogi Adityanath is set to go for an expansion of the ministry next week.
Sources here on Saturday said the BJP high command had given the green signal for the expansion of the Yogi Adityanath ministry. The cabinet expansion will take place in the first week of September.
It is believed that the party will take care of caste and regional representations this time in the ministry expansion just before the crucial 2022 assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh.
It is expected that seven to eight ministers can be administered oath while no present minister will be removed, sources said.
Some legislators of the allies will also be accommodated in the ministry. Along with Brahmin, Nishad and Gurjar society, Gond, Jat and Patel community will also be taken care of.
The probable leaders who could be inducted into the ministry are Jitin Prasada, who came from Congress to the BJP, and Sanjay Nishad, national president of Nishad Party.
Along with these, Somendra from Meerut, Krishna Paswan from Fatehpur, Tejpal Gurjar from Dadri in Ghaziabad, Ramchandra Vishwakarma, Manju Siwach and Ashish Patel from Apna Dal could also get a berth in the ministry.
After the formation of the state government on March 19, 2017, the first ministry expansion of the Yogi Adityanath government took place on August 22, 2019. During that time there were 56 members in the council of ministers. Three ministers have died due to coronavirus infection.
In the first ministry expansion, six ministers with independent charge were administered the oath of cabinet, in which three new faces were also included.
In the Yogi Adityanath council of ministers, there are 23 cabinet ministers, nine ministers of state with independent charge and 22 ministers of state. The total number of ministers is 54. A total of six ministerial posts are still vacant.