Oli-led 22-member Cabinet has no Dalit minister

KATHMANDU: Prime Minister Khadga Prasad Oli formed a 22-member Cabinet on Monday but without representing a sizeable population of the Dalit community. 

Chairperson of CPN-UML Oli toppled the CPN (Maoist Centre) chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal-led government withdrawing his party’s support to form his government.  

President Ram Chandra Poudel administered oath of office and secrecy to Prime Minister Oli and his Cabinet members.

The new Cabinet includes 10 ministers from the Nepali Congress (NC), UML has eight ministers besides Oli, Janata Samajbadi Party (JSP) has two ministers and one from Loktantrik Samajbadi Party (LSP).

 The new Cabinet includes Prakash Man Singh (NC) as Deputy Prime Minister and Urban Development Minister; Bishnu Poudel (UML) as Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister; Prithvi Subba Gurung (UML) as Minister for Communication and Information Technology; Ramesh Lekhak (NC) as Home Minister; Deepak Khadka (NC) as Energy Minister, Ajay Chaurasiya (NC) as Law Minister; Ain Bahadur Shahi (NC) as Forest Minister; and Teju Lal Chaudhary (NC) as Youth and Sports Minister.

Similarly, Pradeep Poudel (NC) has been appointed as the Health Minister; Badri Pandey (NC) as the Culture, Tourism, and Civil Aviation Minister; Ram Nath Adhikari (NC) as the Agriculture Minister; Bidhya Bhattarai (UML) as Education Minister; Manbir Rai (UML) as Defence Minister; Raj Kumar Gupta (UML) as Federal Affairs and General Administration Minister; Damodar Bhandari (UML) as Industry Minister; Devendra Dahal (UML) as Physical Infrastructure Minister; Nawal Kishor Sah (JSP) as Women Children and Senior Citizen Minister; Pradip Yadav (JSP) as Water Supply Minister and Sharat Singh Bhandari (LSP) as Labour, Employment and Social Security Minister and Balaram Adhikari (UML) as Land Management, Cooperatives and Poverty Alleviation Minister.  

Arzu Deuba, wife of NC President Sher Bahadur Deuba, has been appointed Foreign Minister in Oli’s Cabinet. 

The 25-member Cabinet has three seats vacant, in which the Prime Minister can appoint state ministers. The previous Dahal-led government also had no Dalit Minister but had included four female ministers.