The mystery of growing number of bachelor Chief Ministers in India

From Yogi Adityanath to ML Khattar, there are several bachelor Chief Ministers in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government

By: News Desk |
March 20, 2017 11:31 am

Does Prime Minister Narendra Modi keep the marital status of leaders into account before choosing them as the Chief Ministers of a state? The current status of his CMs might hint at that. On Sunday, yogi Adityanath took over as the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh joining three other politicians who are unmarried CMs from Bharatiya Janata Party.

44-year-old Yogi Adityanath has been a controversial figure in politics. His hardcore statements on Hindutva have always overshadowed the development work that he has carried out in his constituency as a 5-time member of Parliament. With BJP coming back to power in UP after 15 years, Yogi Adityanath has become the first male bachelor Chief Minister of the country’s most populous state.

Earlier on Saturday, 56-year old Trivendra Singh Rawat was sworn in as the CM of Uttarakhand. An RSS pracharak, Rawat is known as an excellent organiser. The Uttarakhand CM is a post graduate in journalism from Garhwal University’s Shrinagar campus. He was associated with the party as pradesh BJP organisation. It was for the first time in 2002 that he was elected from the Doiwala seat in the state’s first assembly elections.

ML Khattar is another BJP leader who is the CM of Haryana. A sworn bachelor, Khattar is a Punjabi. He is often considered close to Modi. He had been an RSS pracharak for the past 40 years and an active BJP member for more than 20 years.

Another political leader in the league is Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal. The 54-year-old Assam CM began his political career with the All Assam Students Union before moving to Asom Gana Parishad. He later moved to BJP in 2011 and was made the president of Assam unit of the party in 2012.

Apart from the BJP, there are other non-BJP leaders who are bachelor CMs too. This includes Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. Patnaik, the 70-year-old BJD chief, took oath in 2014 as the CM for the fourth time in a row. Patnaik who has been ruling Odisha since 2000, has often stated that with him having no family, there is no danger of him indulging in dynasty politics.

When Mamata Banerjee took oath as the CM, she became the first woman to do so. The firebrand leader joined Congress in the 1970s and soon elevated to become the General Secretary of the “Mahila Congress”. In 1997, she formed her own party All India Trinamool Congress to give a direct competition to the Communist party in West Bengal.