By TCN Staff Reporter,
Mumbai: The Prithviraj Chavan-led council of ministers in Maharashtra that took oath on Friday has lower representation of Muslims in many years as the Congress has included only one member from the largest minority community in the new ministry.
The Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), the other partner of the coalition government, has made two Muslims as state minister from its own quota.
Maharshtra Assembly
For the 288-member assembly, there can be 43-member council of ministers. The Congress and NCP have agreed on the old formula of 23-20 ratio in the ministry. Each partner has inducted 20 ministers each with Congress leaving 3 seats of its quota vacant.
In the 40-member council of ministers there are 30 cabinet rank ministers and 10 state ministers. Both Congress and NCP have equal number of cabinet and state ministers. Of these 40 ministers, 22 are Marathas, 7 from Other Backward Classes (OBCs), 4 from Scheduled Tribes (ST), 3 from Scheduled Castes (SC), 3 are Muslims and one is a Jain.
In the Ashok Chavan team and his predecessor Vilasrao Deshmukh’s also, there were four Muslim faces. But in the new ministry that took oath after the unceremonial exit of Ashok Chavan following Adarsh Society scam, there are only three ministers: Arif Naseem Khan (Cong), Hasan Miyan Musharraf (NCP) and Fauzia Khan (NCP). Only one of them Naseem Khan is in the cabinet. Fauzia Khan is Member of Legislative Council while other two are Members of Legislative Assembly.
In the 288-member Assembly there are 11 Muslim MLAs: 5 from Congress, 3 Samajwadi Party, 2 Nationalist Congress Party and one from Jan Surajya Shakti. According to the Census 2001, Muslims constitute 10.6% of the total 96,878,627 population in the state.