Nitish Kumar was sworn in on Thursday for an unprecedented tenth term as Bihar’s chief minister, capping the National Democratic Alliance’s emphatic return to power in the state. The oath was administered by Governor Arif Mohammed Khan at Patna’s historic Gandhi Maidan, the same ground where Jayaprakash Narayan once called for “total revolution” in 1974.
Kumar, the long-time Janata Dal (United) leader, took office alongside senior Bharatiya Janata Party figures Vijay Kumar Sinha and Samrat Choudhary, who will serve as deputy chief ministers. Twenty-six ministers were inducted into the cabinet, though none from Chirag Paswan’s LJP(RV) or Upendra Kushwaha’s Rashtriya Lok Morcha were included despite their sizeable representation in the assembly.
Among the new faces was Shreyasi Singh, the Commonwealth Games gold-medallist shooter, who returned to the assembly from Jamui and now enters government for the first time. Rama Nishad, newly elected from Aurai, was also brought into the cabinet.
Veteran JD(U) legislator Bijendra Prasad Yadav — now serving his ninth term , reclaimed a ministerial berth. Three ministers were sworn in from the legislative council, including Ashok Choudhary, considered one of Kumar’s closest confidants.
The NDA swept the polls with 202 of the 243 assembly seats. The BJP emerged as the single-largest party with 89 seats, followed closely by JD(U)’s 85. The alliance partners HAM(S) and RLM secured modest footholds.
Kumar had resigned on Wednesday, a procedural step ahead of his re-election as leader of the NDA legislature party. The BJP appointed Samrat Choudhary and Vijay Kumar Sinha as its legislature leader and deputy leader respectively, with central observers including UP deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya overseeing the selection.
The swearing-in ceremony drew a significant show of strength from across the NDA. BJP president JP Nadda and several chief ministers — including Uttar Pradesh’s Yogi Adityanath, Maharashtra’s Devendra Fadnavis, Andhra Pradesh’s N. Chandrababu Naidu and Gujarat’s Bhupendra Patel , were in attendance.
Ahead of the ceremony, Kumar took to social media to frame the moment as a renewal of Bihar’s development journey. “This sentence — ‘I, Nitish Kumar, swear by God’ — is a symbol of the unwavering faith of crores of Biharis,” he wrote, describing the day as “historic”.
Away from the celebrations, Jan Suraaj Party founder Prashant Kishor admitted that his decision not to contest the election was a “mistake”, after his fledgling party polled under 4%. Kishor, who began a day-long silent fast at the Bhitiharwa Ashram in West Champaran , where he launched a 3,500-km padyatra three years ago ,said he remained determined to fight future elections. “I will not back down without winning Bihar,” he told NDTV.
Full list of ministers sworn in
Vijay Kumar Choudhary (JD-U), Bijendra Prasad Yadav (JD-U), Shravan Kumar (JD-U), Mangal Pandey (BJP), Dilip Kumar Jaiswal (BJP), Ashok Choudhary (JD-U), Lesi Singh (JD-U), Madan Sahani (JD-U), Nitin Nabin (BJP), Ram Kripal Yadav (BJP), Santosh Kumar Suman (HAM), Sunil Kumar (JD-U), Mohammad Zama Khan (JD-U), Sanjay Singh Tigar (BJP), Arun Shankar Prasad (BJP), Surendra Mehta (BJP), Narayan Prasad (BJP), Rama Nishad (BJP), Lakhendra Kumar Raushan (BJP), Shreyashi Singh (BJP), Pramod Kumar (BJP), Sanjay Kumar (LJP-RV), Sanjay Kumar Singh (LJP-RV), Deepak Prakash (RLM).
