Patna, 15 April (H.S.):

On Wednesday, Samrat Choudhary, leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the NDA legislature party, took the oath as Bihar's new Chief Minister, administering the oaths of office and secrecy.

At Patna's Raj Bhavan, Governor Lieutenant General Syed Ata Hasnain (Retd.) administered the oath to him. With Samrat Choudhary's ascension to Chief Minister, a fresh chapter in Bihar's political history has dawned.

He took the oaths of office and secrecy as the BJP's first Chief Minister in the state. Alongside him, from the Janata Dal United (JD(U)) quota, two Deputy Chief Ministers—Vijay Choudhary and Vijendra Prasad Yadav—were also administered oaths of office and secrecy.

Life and Education

Samrat Choudhary was born on November 16, 1968, in Lakhanpur village, Munger. His mother, Parvati Devi, and father, Shakuni Choudhary, were also Bihari politicians. After completing his basic education, he pursued higher studies at Madurai Kamaraj University.

Choudhary hails from the Koeri-Kushwaha caste and has served as the BJP's OBC face. He is married to Mamta Kumari, with whom he has one son and one daughter. He is also known by his alias, Rakesh Kumar.

Early Political Career

Samrat Choudhary entered active politics in 1990 and took oath as Agriculture Minister in Rabri Devi's government on May 19, 1999. He contested and won from the Parbatta assembly constituency in 2000 and 2010, serving as the chief whip of the opposition in the Bihar Assembly.

On June 2, 2014, he was sworn in as Minister for Urban Development and Housing in Jitan Ram Manjhi's government and assumed charge. He also served as Urban Development and Housing, Health Minister in the 2014 Jitan Ram Manjhi ministry, and as Weights and Measures and Horticulture Minister in the 1999 Rabri Devi ministry.

JD(U) Government

In 2021, Samrat was inducted into the expanded cabinet from the BJP quota as Panchayati Raj Minister. In March 2021, he drew nationwide attention for a heated debate with Bihar Assembly Speaker Vijay Kumar Sinha over a question raised by an MLA regarding his department's functioning. He later apologized to the Speaker for breaching the House's decorum.

Under his leadership, the Panchayati Raj Ministry took several steps to enhance organizational structure, such as recruiting more staff in the sanitation department and facilitating safe disposal of stray animal carcasses. His ministry also planned inter-departmental support with other ministerial departments.

BJP State President

In March 2023, Samrat Choudhary was appointed BJP's state president for Bihar, replacing Sanjay Jaiswal. Political analysts viewed this as a strategic move by the party leadership to consolidate support among Koeri or Kushwaha caste voters, the second-largest caste group after Yadavs, dominant in several Bihar districts.

Following his appointment as state chief, Rabri Devi remarked, It seems the BJP has turned its back on Banias and therefore picked a Mahato for the president's post. As BJP state president, Samrat Choudhary led the party in Bihar and reportedly launched verbal attacks on Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on various occasions.

In May 2023, while attempting to meet five-time former BJP MLA Jawahar Prasad, jailed for his role in Sasaram Ram Navami violence, he was stopped by authorities. In a press statement on May 3, 2023, Choudhary accused Nitish Kumar of promoting criminals and targeting saints.

List of Bihar's Chief Ministers to Date

Dr. Srikrishna Singh

Deep Narayan Singh

Binodanand Jha

Krishna Ballabh Sahay

Mahamaya Prasad Sinha

Satish Prasad Singh

Bindeshwari Prasad Mandal

Bhola Paswan Shastri

Harihar Singh

Daroga Prasad Rai

Karpoori Thakur

Kedar Pandey

Abdul Ghafoor

Jagannath Mishra

Ramsundar Das

Chandrashekhar Singh

Bindeshwari Dubey

Bhagwat Jha Azad

Satyendra Narayan Sinha

Lalu Prasad Yadav

Rabri Devi

Nitish Kumar

Jitan Ram Manjhi

Samrat Choudhary

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Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar