Harsh Sanghavi took oath as the deputy chief minister of Gujarat on Friday during a swearing-in ceremony for the new cabinet members at Mahatma Mandir in Gandhinagar.

Sanghavi had earlier served as the Minister of State for Home in the last cabinet and is a three-time MLA from the Majura Assembly constituency in Surat.

The BJP government in Gujarat announced a new 26-member cabinet on Friday. The list includes Swaroopji Thakor, Praveenkumar Mali, Rushikesh Patel, Darshna Waghela, Kunvarji Bavaliya, Rivaba Jadeja, Arjun Modhwadia, Parshottam Solanki, Jitendra Waghani, Praful Pansheriya, Harsh Sanghvi and Kanubhai Desai, among others.

Governor Acharya Devvrat administered the oath to the 25 new ministers, taking the total strength of the cabinet to 26, including Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel.

The decision to bring in new faces has come three years after the government was formed and two years before the 2027 Assembly elections, signalling a major reshuffle ahead of the polls.

Earlier in the day, Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel met Governor Acharya Devvrat for a courtesy meeting. During the discussion, Patel updated him on the cabinet’s current status and sought his approval to hold the swearing-in ceremony for the new ministers.

A day before the expansion, all 16 ministers except Bhupendra Patel had resigned from their posts to make way for the new team.

The earlier cabinet under Patel had 17 members, with eight holding cabinet ranks and the rest serving as Ministers of State.

Gujarat, which has a 182-member assembly, can have a maximum of 27 ministers, which is 15 per cent of the total strength of the House.

Earlier this month, Minister of State Jagdish Vishwakarma took charge as the new president of the Gujarat BJP unit, replacing Union minister C R Paatil. Party sources told ANI that Vishwakarma’s name was not included in the new cabinet because of the BJP’s rule of 'one person, one post'.

The reshuffle is being seen as an attempt by the ruling party to inject new energy into the administration and strengthen the BJP’s governance team in Gujarat.