(PTI)
Dharmendra Pradhan was on Wednesday inducted as India’s new Education Minister while Annapurna Devi, Subhas Sarkar and Rajkumar Ranjan Singh will be the new Ministers of State for Education. Son of former union minister of state for surface transport, Debendra Pradhan, Dharmendra was Petroleum Minister in the previous Cabinet.
Pradhan became an MP in 2004 after successfully contesting from the Deogarh parliamentary constituency. While he lost the 2009 assembly elections he went on to become the BJP national secretary and then the general secretary.By 2012, he got elected to Rajya Sabha from Bihar. And when Narendra Modi swept to power in 2014 polls, he was made union Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas with independent charge.
In a cabinet reshuffle in 2017, he was elevated to the rank of union minister for the same ministry, with an additional charge of the ministry of skill development and entrepreneurship. He again was made a cabinet minister in Modi 2.0 government.Pradhan will succeed Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ as the Education Minister, who resigned earlier in the day citing health reasons.Subhas Sarkar, a seasoned war horse of the BJP in West Bengal, is MP from Bankura and will now be the Minister of State for Education.
