Jharkhand gets its first tribal and woman Governor

According to the 2011 census, about 8.6% of India’s population is comprised of people from the Schedule Tribes. And almost 90% of India’s central and eastern tribal belt population is rural, with primitive agriculture, because of which, there is little political representation from this sector of the society. This is however, slowly changing. In a double-win for the tribal population and women, Draupadi Murmu, was sworn in as the first tribal woman Governor of Jharkhand.

According to a report by Daily Mail, 56 year-old Murmu worked as a clerk in the state secretariat before joining politics and was accorded a guard of honour by the state police before being escorted to the Raj Bhavan for the oath-taking ceremony.

Draupadi Murmu with court chief justice Virendra Singh
Picture By: One India

The graduate from RB Women’s College in Bhubaneshwar will be succeeding Syed Ahmed, who will take over as Manipur Governor. Murmu previously headed the BJP's Mayurbhanj district unit in Odisha and had represented Rairangpur in the Odisha assembly. The two-time BJP MLA was a minister in the Naveen Patnaik Cabinet and was the tribal face of the BJP in Mayurbhanj district.

A host of important dignitaries were present during the oath-taking ceremony which was administered by Jharkhand high court chief justice Virendra Singh. These dignitaries included, Jharkhand Chief Minister Raghubar Das, his Cabinet colleagues, former chief ministers Shibu Soren and Arjun Munda, Union Minister of State for Rural Development Sudarshan Bhagat, among others.

Jharkhand State News>