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Giridhar Gopal in Bhubaneswar
Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Tuesday inducted eight new ministers in his 29-month-old government.
The chief minister has inducted four Cabinet ministers -- Dr Damodar Rout, Prafulla Ghadai, Suryanarayan Patra, Kalindi Behera and four ministers of state -- Panchanan Kanungo Balabhadra Majhi, Bisnupriya Behera and Himansu Meher.
While Meher is from the Bharatiya Janata Party, others are from Patnaik's Biju Janata Dal.
The new ministers took oath at Raj Bhavan at 9 am on Tuesday.
It was the first ministry expansion by Patnaik, who assumed office in March 2000 as the legislative party leader of the Biju Janata Dal and its alliance partner Bharatiya Janata Party with 25 ministers.
The number of the ministers had been reduced to 21 after he sacked three ministers -- two of the BJD and one of the BJP -- on corruption charges last year, and one minister died.
With the resignation of four ministers on Monday night the strength had come down to 17.
The total number of ministers in Patnaik has now gone up to 25. Patnaik has not ruled out another expansion in the future.
Ahead of the expansion Patnaik had asked four ministers -- Adwait Prasad Singh (forest and environment), Duryodhan Majhi (information and public relations), Debi Prasad Mishra (health and family welfare) and Amar Prasad Satpathy (agriculture) -- to resign.
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