AP CM YS Jagan Mohan Reddy continues with 5 Deputy CMs

Andhra Pradesh chief minister Y.S Jagan Mohan Reddy announced five Deputy Chief Ministers this time too. He retained both K. Narayana Swamy and Amzad Basha as  Deputy CMs in the new cabinet. The CM also retained the portfolios of  Excise and Minority Welfare that the two were holding in the first cabinet.

The other three Deputy CMs are Peedika Rajanna Dora with Tribal Welfare, Budi Muthyala Naidu with Panchayat Raj and Rural Development, and Kottu Satyanarayana with Endowments portfolios. The new team took oath at the Velagapudi secretariat on Monday.

CM Jagan Mohan Reddy has taken almost a week to compose his new cabinet, in which he retained 11 ministers from the outgoing cabinet, while adding 14 new faces. The cabinet is a clear composition of firebrand leaders on one side and soft-spoken ones on the other. He has accommodated more backward-class ministers, which is aimed at targeting the TDP's vote bank and to silence the opposition.

The



composition of the cabinet with a clear option towards backward classes is a clear move by Jagan Reddy to lure them away from the Telugu Desam Party ahead of the general elections. The Women and child welfare minister in the previous cabinet, Taneti Vanitha, was given the Home Ministry.

Caste-wise, the CM has kept the Vysya community out of his new cabinet. The new cabinet does not have any Brahmin and  Kshatriya faces either.

Meanwhile, protests continued in different pockets in AP, even after the new cabinet took oath on Monday, with ruling party cadres voicing their anger over the non-representation of the freshly carved district in the new cabinet. Supporters of  Samineni Udaya Bhanu destroyed the CM's hoardings, alleging that people who accompanied Jagan Mohan Reddy from 2009 have been ignored.

The cadres working with former Home Minister, Mekathoti Sucharitha also are unhappy about ignoring their leader.