Pradhan to become longest-serving oil minister

May 31, 2019 19:22

Ujjwala-man Dharmendra Pradhan is set to become India's longest-serving Oil Minister as he set out for a second stint, during which his priorities he said will be to raise domestic oil and gas production, expedite creation of national gas grid and create common market-friendly infrastructure.

Pradhan is the only oil minister after Atal Bihari Vajpayee government's Ram Naik to have completed full five-year term.

But unlike Naik, he has been reassigned the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, which he had made a common household name through the free LPG cooking gas connection scheme Ujjwala in the first stint.

Late Murli Deora too had a five-year stint -- from January 2006 to January 2011, as the oil minister but it was split over two governments, both led by the United Progressive Alliance.

With Prime Minister Narendra Modi reposing faith in him again, Pradhan is set to break the records of Naik and Deora to be the longest-serving Oil Minister of the country.

Hailing from Odisha, where his almost weekly visits and thousands of public meetings helped create a groundswell for the BJP in the state, he paid obeisance at Shree Jagannath Temple in Puri in the morning before coming to the national capital to take charge as the Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas.

In Modi 2.0 government, he has also been given additional charge of Ministry of Steel.

He took charge of that ministry as well. -- PTI

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