National Conference Vice President Omar Abdullah was sworn in as the Chief Minister of the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir on Wednesday.
He is the first CM of the J&K UT that lost its statehood after reorganisation and abrogation of Article 370 in 2019.
Oath of office was administered to Omar Abdullah by Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha at Sher-i-Kashmir International Conference Centre (SKICC) in Srinagar.
Along with him, five MLAs including an Independent took oath as Cabinet Ministers as there was no Congress representation in the new government.
Independent MLA Satish Sharma took oath as minister. Sharma defeated former Deputy CM and senior Congress leader Tara Chand from the Chhamb Assembly seat in the Jammu district.
Leaders from the INDIA bloc who attended the ceremony were Lok Sabha Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi, Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti, AAP leader Sanjay Singh, CPI leader D. Raja, and many more.
Present at the initial time was the National Conference chief Farooq Abdullah, who had declared that his son, Omar Abdullah, would be CM soon after the trends during the counting on October 8 showed his party was leading.
Jammu and Kashmir Congress Chief Tariq Hameed Karra said today that the Congress was not joining the ministry at this stage. The Congress had resolved to support the NC government from outside the house as they failed to get two ministerial berths in the cabinet.
Immediately after taking oath as ministers, Chief Minister Omar Abdullah will hold a meeting of all the administrative secretaries at the Srinagar Civil Secretariat.
No senior leader of the National Conference could garner a cabinet berth so far.
Security was enhanced in Srinagar city before the oath-taking ceremony.
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