Mahant becomes Union minister, Cong elated

Raipur, July 12, 2011

It was celebration time for Congress after several years on Tuesday when Korba Parliamentarian Charandas Mahant got berth in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s team as Union Minister of State for Agriculture and Food Processing. The elated party workers were seen bursting crackers and distributing sweets at different parts of the city including Jaistambh chowk. The PCC president Nandkumar Patel, AICC treasurer Motilal Vora, senior leader Vidya Charan Shukla and others extended their gratitude to the PM and the party supremo Sonia Gandhi for giving Chhattisgarh MP an opportunity in union government.

Patel said the state got representation at Centre at right time and would certainly get benefited in coming days. “We are confident that Mahant will ensure all-round development of Chhattisgarh,” he said.

Mahant (57) has been minister in undivided Madhya Pradesh thrice and held significant portfolios like - Minister of State for Agriculture Department, Minister of State for Commercial Tax Department (Independent charge) and Cabinet Minister, Home Affairs and Public Relations. This is his third term in Lok Sabha as he got elected as member of 12^th Lok Sabha in 1998 and 13^th Lok Sabha in 1999.

Mahant also held post of Chhattisgarh Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) president for about three years from January 2006 to January 2009 before he was elected as member of 15^th Lok Sabha.

The Congress leaders who congratulated Mahant for getting ministerial berth in Centre are – MLAs Amitesh Shukla, Dr Renu Jogi, Paresh Bagbahra, Kuldeep Juneja, Agni Chandrakar, Gurmukh Singh Hora and Jaisingh Agrawal along with Bupesh Baghel, Tarun Chaterjee, Ramesh Varlyani, Rajendra Tiwari, Kiranmayi Nayak, Santosh Agrawal, Mahendra Chhabra, Iqbal Ahmed Rizvi, Ravindra Shukla, Jaswant Cladius, Daulat Rohra, Inderchand Dhariwal, Suresh Mishra, Haji Sheikh Najimuddin, Mahendra Kumar Kochhar, Madan Taleda, Usha Rajjan Shrivastava, Lakhvinder Singh Gill, Kalpana Patel, Ayesha Siddiqui, Saurabh Mishra, Chandrawati Sahu, Shobha Yadav and others.