MAY 30, 1: 50 pm marked a new beginning for the Bharatiya Janata Party in Karnataka. It was then that Bookanakere Siddalingappa Yeddyurappa was sworn in the 25th chief minister of Karnataka, marking a saffron dawn in South India.
Savouring the historic occasion were top party leaders such as L K Advani, Rajnath Singh, Narendra Modi, Venkaiah Naidu and Arun Jaitley. Twenty-nine MLAs were also sworn in as ministers with Cabinet ranks. (See the list below ).
"I swear in the name of the farmer and God," Yeddyurappa said while taking oath even as a crowd of 75,000 cheered him on.
Yeddyurappa was administered oath of office by Governor Rameshwar Thakur on the steps of the historic Vidhan Soudha, which houses the Karnataka Legislative Assembly and the Legislative Council.
Showing victory signs to his supporters, Yeddyurappa sought the blessings of senior BJP leaders after being sworn in.
Bangalore has been transformed into a saffron city, thanks to the thousands of BJP flags that were put up. The big banners and massive cut outs that were missing during the elections were back donning every nook and corner of the city. Most BJP supporters walked at least 20 km to reach Vidhan Soudha as vehicles were not permitted into the city.
This is the second time that Yeddyurappa is being sworn in as the chief minister of Karnataka. The last experience turned out to be a bitter experience as the BJP government was pulled down after seven days by coalition partner, the Janata Dal (S).
The ministers with Cabinet rank are:
Govind M Karjol
K S Eshwarappa
V S Acharya
C M Udasi
Mumtaz Ali Khan
Ramachandre Gowda
R Ashok
S A Ravindranath
Janardhan Reddy
Bache Gowda
V H Kageri
Karunakar Reddy
Basavaraj Bommai
Sriramulu
Shobha Karandlage
Krishna Palemar
Suresh Kumar
Revu Nayak
Venkatramanappa
S N Krishnaiah Setty
Arvind Limbavalli
H Halappa
Lakshman Pavadi
M Rudrappa
S K Belluppi
D Sudhakar (Independent)
Narendra Swamy (Independent)
S Thangadgi (Independent)
G Shekhar (Independent)
