West Bengal: Ministers Lose Elections, Receive Ministerial Ranks

Four former ministers in West Bengal get Ministerial ranks to utilise their expertise, without having won elections.

Kolkata: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee with cabinet colleagues during her first cabinet meeting at the Secretariat, Nabanna in Howrah near Kolkata. (Photo: PTI)

Four West Bengal ministers, who had lost the Assembly elections in West Bengal, will be back in their erstwhile departments in the rank of a minister by the state government, officials said on 30 May.

To utilise their experience and expertise in the departments they had led in their earlier term, former power minister Manish Gupta was being appointed as an Advisor to the Chief Minister on power and non-conventional energy sources in the rank of a cabinet minister, officials said.

For co-ordination and synergy in power and non-conventional energy departments, a committee would be formed with Gupta as the chairperson and CMDs of state power utilities as its members.

Chandrima Bhattacharya, former minister of state for health, law and judicial affairs, will be appointed as chairperson of West Bengal Medical Services Corporation in the rank of a minister of state.

Former PWD minister Sankar Chakraborty would become chairman of three state PSUs – Mackintosh Burn, Westinghouse Saxby Farmer Ltd and Britannia Engineering – in the rank and pay equivalent to that of a cabinet minister, officials said.

Upendranath Biswas, former backward class welfare minister, would get a new position as chairman of two corporations under the department, they added.