Gandhinagar: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Bhupendra Patel will be sworn in as Gujarat Chief Minister for a second term in Gandhinagar on Monday in the presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other dignitaries, BJP leaders said on Sunday.
Bhupendra Patel will be sworn in as the 18th Chief Minister by Governor Acharya Devvrat at a function to be held at 2 pm at the Helipad Ground near the new Secretariat in Gandhinagar.
Apart from the prime minister, Union Home Minister Amit Shah and chief ministers of other BJP-ruled states will also attend the swearing-in ceremony, BJP sources said. Along with Patel, some new ministers are also expected to be sworn in.
In the just-concluded Gujarat Assembly elections held on December 8, the BJP won its seventh consecutive term by winning a record 156 seats in the 182-member House. Congress won 17 constituencies and AAP 5.
Patel, 60, resigned as chief minister on Friday along with his entire cabinet to pave the way for the formation of a new government after the election results. He was elected as the leader of the BJP legislature party on Saturday. He met the governor and bet on forming the next government.
Patel won the Ghatlodia seat with the highest margin of 1.92 lakh votes in the election. A low-profile BJP leader and the first from the Kadva Patidar sub-group to become CM, Patel replaced Vijay Rupani in September 2021.
Meanwhile, hectic consultations are underway in the BJP to select ministerial candidates against the backdrop of a historic mandate as the party will have to walk a tightrope of balancing caste and regional representation, sources said.
MLAs Kanu Desai, Raghavji Patel, Rushikesh Patel, Harsh Sanghavi, Shankar Chaudhary, Purnesh Modi, Manisha Vakil, Ramanlal Vora, and Raman Patkar are among those expected to be inducted into the ministry, they added.