Jammu: Jammu and Kashmir Assembly speaker Kavinder Gupta and seven others were on Monday took oath as ministers in the state's PDP-BJP government led by Mehbooba Mufti.

Now Gupta will be the new deputy chief minister in place of Nirmal Singh. Singh submitted his resignation Sunday night, officials said.

The new BJP ministers were the party's state unit chief Satpal Sharma and the MLAs from Kathua and adjoining Sambha, Rajiv Jasrotia and Devinder Kumar Manyal, respectively.

The BJP also elevated Sunil Sharma, at present minister of state for transport, to the rank of a cabinet minister. BJP legislator Shakti Raj took oath as a minister of state.

The PDP members comprise in the cabinet were Mohd Khalil Band, MLA from Pulwama, and Mohd Ashraf Mir, MLA from Sonwar.

The BJP has jumped down Nirmal Singh, health minister Bali Bhagat and Minister of State (MoS) for Tourism Priya Sethi.

Their resignations have been accepted along with that of law minister Abdul Haq Khan by Governor NN Vohra. Sunil Sharma, who was upgraded as Cabinet minister, also resigned as MoS.

BJP national general secretary Ram Madhav and MoS in the PMO Jitendra Singh attended the event.

The oath of office and secrecy was administered by the governor at the convention centre instead of the Raj Bhavan as the state government has already moved its base to summer capital Srinagar, part of the bi-annual darbar move under which the government functions for six months in Jammu and six months in Srinagar.

The state can have a maximum of 25 ministers, together with the chief minister, out of which 14 portfolios are with the PDP and the rest of the BJP.