The Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan lead CPI(M) is all set for their second innings and is prepping up for the swearing-in ceremony, that is scheduled to happen on May 20. On Tuesday, the CPI(M) state committee announced the new ministerial department of the state and it came as a big surprise when the senior leader KK Shailaja got excluded from the cabinet.

The new ministers named in Pinarayi 2.0 govt are MV Govindan, K Radhakrishnan, KN Balagopal, P Rajeev, VN Vasavan, Saji Cherian, V Sivankutty, Mohd Riyas, Dr. R Bindu, Veena George, and V Abdul Rahman. Along with them, TP Ramakrishnan has also been appointed as the Parliamentary Party Secretary. The party has selected MB Rajesh as Speaker candidate and KK Shailaja as Party Whip.

No one from the earlier LDF ministry is part of the new ministry except for the Chief Minister. This is our party decision. Only our party has the courage to do so. Many top performers were also not allowed to contest elections. We want new faces, AN Shamsheer, a CPM MLA, told NDTV.

KK Shailaja's exclusion has drawn sharp reactions on social media, even from the opposition members like Congress leader Shashi Tharoor. Sorry to see Shailaja Teacher leave the Kerala cabinet. Aside from her reputed competence and efficiency, I always found her helpful, responsive, and accessible as Health Minister, especially during the #Covid crisis. She will be missed, Mr Tharoor, a Congress MP from Kerala, wrote on Twitter.

KK Shailaja, the health minister in the outgoing LDF government has been globally praised a lot for handling the situation of the coronavirus pandemic in the state. Shailaja, fondly known as Shailaja teacher, has a brilliant record of remarkable achievements in the health sector especially during the Nipah outbreak as well. She was also elected from the Mattannur assembly seat with a historic margin of 60,000 votes in this assembly election. In September, the UK-based Prospect magazine selected KK Shailaja as the Top Thinker of the Year 2020. Social media is flooded with posts attacking the government for dropping a minister whose performance likely contributed to its election victory.