Narendra Tomar, Sadananda Gowda given Ananth Kumar Cabinet’s portfolios

A Rashtrapati Bhawan communique said that Statistics Minister Sadananda Gowda has been given charge of Chemicals and Fertilizers Ministry, which was also held by Kumar.

The portfolios held by Union minister Ananth Kumar, who died of cancer on Monday, were re-assigned on Tuesday by President Ram Nath Kovind, on the advice of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

While Union rural development, panchayati raj and mines minister Narendra Singh Tomar was given additional charge of parliamentary affairs, the chemicals and fertilizers portfolio was allotted to D V Sadananda Gowda, the minister for statistics and programme implementation, a Rashtrapati Bhavan communique said.

In the evening, the Union cabinet met under the leadership of the Prime Minister to express sorrow at the demise of Ananth Kumar. A resolution passed in the meeting said that “in his passing away, the nation has lost an experienced leader.”

“Shri Ananthkumar was an active social worker and was involved through his NGOs in undertaking many social service projects such as providing nutritious mid-day meal to under-privileged school children with Government support, running a mobile unit fitted with educational gadgets covering different schools situated in slums of Bengaluru, adoption of Government schools to provide drinking water and other facilities and running vocational training programmes for under-privileged, especially girls and women. He also launched an initiative called ‘Green Bengaluru 1:1’, which aims to increase the green cover in Bengaluru,” the cabinet resolution said.

Fifty-nine-year-old Ananth Kumar, cabinet minister and six-time member of Parliament, died on Monday in Bengaluru after a long battle against cancer.