Actor-politician Pawan Kalyan was appointed as the Deputy Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh on Friday as the newly formed government allocated portfolios. The State Cabinet currently has 25 MLAs including the CM.
"Congratulations to Pawan Kalyan on becoming the Deputy Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh. I congratulate all my colleagues in the cabinet on being assigned their portfolios," said Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu in social media post.
The CM retained Law and Order while Kalyan was given several departments including Panchayati Raj, Environment, Forest, and Science & Technology. Meanwhile his son Nara Lokesh was alloted Human Resources Development, Information Technology, Electronics and Communication.
The Home Affairs and Disaster Management departments will be helmed by Anitha Vangalapudi while Payyavula Keshav was given Finance. Satya Kumar Yadav will lead the Health department. P Narayana was allotted one of the key departments- Municipal Administration - which would be responsible for the development of the Amaravati capital region.
“There will be a radical change in the administration at all levels hereafter,” Naidu had insisted during a brief interaction with the media on Thursday.
Earlier on Thursday, Naidu had claimed that he would soon take some decisions to bring all the systems ‘back onto track’. He alleged that all departments in the State had become “defunct” in recent years.
“Perhaps some officers who had worked with me when I became the Chief Minister in 1995 for the first time must be here now. I assumed charge for the fourth time as the Chief Minister and I have never experienced such a worse situation in the State as I am witnessing now. IAS, IPS and IFS are highly respectable positions as the officers are appointed without any connection to a particular State,” he told IAS and IPS officers during a meeting.
(With inputs from agencies)
