Ram Nath Kovind (69) and Acharya Dev Vrat (56) were appointed Governors of Bihar and Himachal Pradesh, respectively, on Saturday.
The appointment of Mr. Kovind, 69, a Supreme Court lawyer and old Bharatiya Janata Party hand from Uttar Pradesh, drew flak from Nitish Kumar, Chief Minister of election-bound Bihar, who said the Centre did not consult him. Mr. Dev Vrat, 56, is the Principal of a school in Haryana that promotes Vedic culture and is a yoga teacher.
“As per the precedent so far, the Union Home Minister talks to the State government, its Chief Minister, on it [appointment of Governor] ... This time, there was no consultation. I got the information [about the appointment] through the media,” Mr. Kumar said on the sidelines of a function in Delhi.
A senior Home Ministry official said there was no provision for consultation with the Chief Minister on the appointment.
Janata Dal (United) leader K.C. Tyagi said his party would raise the matter in Parliament to highlight how the “Centre is trying to create political instability in Bihar through malicious practices.” Speaking to The Hindu, Mr. Kovind said: “I was expecting this; talks were on since many days.”
Kovind is a U.P. Dalit leader, Dev Vrat Vedic scholar
Ram Nath Kovind, who was appointed Bihar Governor on Saturday, is a Scheduled Caste leader from Kanpur in Uttar Pradesh. He was elected twice to the Rajya Sabha, between 1994 and 2006.
He was the general secretary of the Akhil Bharatiya Koli Samaj in Kanpur and the national president of the BJP Scheduled Caste Morcha.
“I joined the BJP in 1991 and have been associated with it since then,” he told The Hindu
Acharya Dev Vrat, appointed Himachal Pradesh Governor, is the Principal of Gurukul Kurukshetra in Haryana, a position he has held since he was 24. The school website says he is also a director of the Yoga and Naturopathy Hospital in Kurukshetra. He was a member of the task force in the AYSUH Ministry which organised the International Day of Yoga celebrations at Rajpath on June 21. He looks after the administration of the Arsh Mahavidyalaya, whose stated aim is to prepare individuals proficient in the Vedas, Upanishads and so on to preach and spread the Vedic religion around the globe.
While West Bengal Governor Keshri Nath Tripathi has been holding additional charge of Bihar, Rajasthan Governor Kalyan Singh has additional charge of Himachal Pradesh.
