HYDERABAD: On Tuesday, Nearly sixty-six days after winning an absolute majority in the state assembly, Telangana Chief Minister Kalvakunta Chandrashekar Rao (KCR) expanded his cabinet. A simple swearing-in ceremony was held at the Raj Bhavan for the Telangana cabinet expansion which saw only ten ministers taking the oath of office and secrecy.However, in a surprise move, Telangana Chief Minister out his son KT Rama Rao and nephew T Harish Rao during the cabinet expansion.
It is assume that among those who were inducted as ministers in the Telangana cabinet expansion were - S Niranjan Reddy, Koppula Eashwar, Errabelli Dayakar Rao, V Srinivas Goud, Vemula Prashanth Reddy and Ch Malla Reddy. Meanwhile, A Indrakaran Reddy, Talasani Srinivas Yadav, G Jagadish, Reddy and Etela Rajender, who were part of the cabinet in KCR's previous term, also returned as ministers.
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Andhra Pradesh and Telangana Governor ESL Narasimhan administered the the oath of office and secrecy to the newly-inducted ministers at Raj Bhavan in the presence of the Chief Minister. After the expansion, the strength of Telangana council of ministers has risen to 12.
On December 11, 2018, the Telangana Rashtra Samithi came back to power after winning 88 seats out of 119 assembly seats. Two independent MLAs had pledged their support to TRS after the results, taking the TRS tally to 90. On December 13, KCR took oath as Chief Minister along with Mahmood Ali (Home Minister) were sworn in.
For more than two months, KCR kept everyone, including his partymen, MLAs and his own powerful political family members, guessing. KCR's son Kalvakuntla Taraka Rama Rao, who is also popularly known as KTR, was recently elevated in the party as TRS Working President. Surprisingly, he was not inducted in the ministry.The rumour mill is working overtime as to why KCR did not induct his son KTR and Harish Rao as ministers in his cabinet.
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However several reasons are being attributed to their non-inclusion in the cabinet. One of them is that KCR wants to keep both of them in check and, the other being that he wants to use their services for the upcoming Lok Sabha election 2019 during which the TRS aims to win at least 16 out of 17 Lok Sabha seats in Telangana with the sole exception of Asaduddin Owaisi, for whom the Hyderabad seat has been left. Also, no woman MLA has been able to make it to Telangana cabinet this time too.