List of chief ministers of Bihar

The Chief Minister of Bihar is the chief executive of the Indian state of Bihar. As per the Constitution of India, the Governor of Bihar is the state's de jure head, but de facto executive authority rests with the chief minister. Following elections to the Bihar Legislative Assembly, the governor usually invites the party (or coalition) with a majority of seats to form the government. The governor appoints the chief minister, whose council of ministers are collectively responsible to the assembly. Given that he has the confidence of the assembly, the chief minister's term is for five years and is subject to no term limits.[1]

Chief Minister of Bihar
Incumbent Nitish Kumar since 22 February 2015
Appointer	Governor of Bihar
Inaugural holder	Sri Krishna Singh
Formation	2 April 1946
Website	CM website

From 1946, 23 people have been Chief Minister of Bihar. The inaugural holder was Sri Krishna Sinha of the Indian National Congress, he also has the longest incumbency. The current incumbent is Nitish Kumar who resigned on 26 July 2017 but was again sworn in as the CM on 27 July 2017 with new cabinet ministers hence having incumbency since 22 February 2015 including 1 day as care taker.

Chief Ministers of Bihar

Colour key for parties
Indian National Congress   Indian National Congress (O)   Jana Kranti Dal   Janata Dal, Rashtriya Janata Dal   Janata Dal (United)   Samata Party   Samyukta Socialist Party   Socialist Party   N/A (President's rule)

Janata Dal (United) leader Nitish Kumar had served eight and a half years as Bihar's premier, before stepping down because of his party's poor showing in the 2014 general election.

After Chief Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav was convicted for his involvement in the fodder scam in 1997, he installed his wife Rabri Devi as Chief Minister instead. Together, they governed for nearly 15 years between 1990 and 2005.

No	Name[2]	Constituency	Term			Party[lower-alpha 1]		Assembly (Election)
1	Sri Krishna Singh	Basantpur West	2 April 1946	1957	5419 days	Indian National Congress		1st Assembly (1952–1957) (1952 election)
			1957	31 January 1961				2nd Assembly (1957–1962) (1957 election)
2	Deep Narayan Singh		1 February 1961	18 February 1961	18 days
3	Binodanand Jha	Rajmahal	18 February 1961	1962	956 days
			1962	2 October 1963				3rd Assembly (1962–1967) (1962 election)
4	K. B. Sahay	Patna West	2 October 1963	5 March 1967	1250 days
5	Mahamaya Prasad Sinha	Patna West	5 March 1967	28 January 1968	330 days	Jana Kranti Dal		4th Assembly (1967–1968) (1967 election)
6	Satish Prasad Singh		28 January 1968	1 February 1968	5 days	Samyukta Socialist Party
7	B. P. Mandal Yadav		1 February 1968	2 March 1968	31 days
8	Bhola Paswan Shastri	Korha	22 March 1968	29 June 1968	100 days	Indian National Congress
–	Vacant[lower-alpha 2] (President's rule)	N/A	29 June 1968	26 February 1969		N/A
9	Harihar Singh	Nayagram	26 February 1969	22 June 1969	117 days	Indian National Congress		5th Assembly (1969–1972) (1969 election)
(8)	Bhola Paswan Shastri [2]	Korha	22 June 1969	4 July 1969	13 days	Indian National Congress (O)
–	Vacant[lower-alpha 2] (President's rule)	N/A	6 July 1969	16 February 1970		N/A
10	Daroga Prasad Rai Yadav	Parsa	16 February. 1970	22 December 1970	310 days	Indian National Congress
11	Karpoori Thakur	Tajpur	22 December 1970	2 June 1971	163 days	Socialist Party
(8)	Bhola Paswan Shastri [3]	Korha	2 June 1971	9 January 1972	222 days (total 335 days)	Indian National Congress
–	Vacant[lower-alpha 2] (President's rule)	N/A	9 January 1972	19 March 1972		N/A
12	Kedar Pandey	Nautan	19 March 1972	2 July 1973	471 days	Indian National Congress		6th Assembly (1972–1977) (1972 election)
13	Abdul Gafoor	Member of Bihar Legislative Council	2 July 1973	11 April 1975	649 days
14	Jagannath Mishra	Jhanjharpur	11 April 1975	30 April 1977	750 days
–	Vacant[lower-alpha 2] (President's rule)	N/A	30 April 1977	24 June 1977		N/A
(11)	Karpoori Thakur	Phulpuras	24 June 1977	21 April 1979	668 days	Janata Party		7th Assembly (1977–1980) (1977 election)
15	Ram Sundar Das	Sonepur	21 April 1979	17 February 1980	303 days
–	Vacant[lower-alpha 2] (President's rule)	N/A	17 February 1980	8 June 1980		N/A
(14)	Jagannath Mishra [2]	Jhanjharpur	8 June 1980	14 August 1983	1133 days	Indian National Congress (I)		8th Assembly (1980–1985) (1980 election)
16	Chandrashekhar Singh		14 August 1983	12 March 1985	577 days
17	Bindeshwari Dubey	Shahpur	12 March 1985	13 February 1988	1068 days			9th Assembly (1985–1990) (1985 election)
18	Bhagwat Jha Azad	Member of Bihar Legislative Council	14 February 1988	10 March 1989	391 days
19	Satyendra Narayan Sinha	Member of Bihar Legislative Council	11 March 1989	6 December 1989	271 days
(14)	Jagannath Mishra [3]	Jhanjharpur	6 December 1989	10 March 1990	95 days (total 1978 days)
20	Lalu Prasad Yadav	Member of Bihar Legislative Council	10 March 1990	28 March 1995	1845 days	Janata Dal		10th Assembly (1990–95) (1990 election)
–	Vacant[lower-alpha 2] (President's rule)	N/A	28 March 1995	4 April 1995		N/A
(20)	Lalu Prasad Yadav [2]	Raghopur	4 April 1995	25 July 1997	844 days (total 2689 days)	Janata Dal, Rashtriya Janata Dal		11th Assembly (1995–2000) (1995 election)
21	Rabri Devi	Member of Bihar Legislative Council	25 July 1997	11 February 1999	538 days	Rashtriya Janata Dal
–	Vacant[lower-alpha 2] (President's rule)	N/A	11 February 1999	9 March 1999		N/A
(21)	Rabri Devi [2]	Member of Bihar Legislative Council	9 March 1999	2 March 2000	359 days	Rashtriya Janata Dal
22	Nitish Kumar [lower-alpha 3]		3 March 2000	10 March 2000	8 days	Samata Party[4]		12th Assembly (Excludes Jharkhand) (2000–05) (2000 election)
(21)	Rabri Devi [3]	Raghopur	11 March 2000	6 March 2005	1821 days (total 2718 days)	Rashtriya Janata Dal [5]
–	Vacant[lower-alpha 2] (President's rule)	N/A	7 March 2005	24 November 2005		N/A		13th Assembly (2005) (February 2005 election)
(22)	Nitish Kumar [2]	Member of Bihar Legislative Council	24 November 2005	26 November 2010	3099 days	Janata Dal (United)		14th Assembly (2005–10) (October 2005 election)
			26 November 2010	20 May 2014				15th Assembly (2010–15) (2010 election)
23	Jitan Ram Manjhi	Makhdumpur	20 May 2014	22 February 2015	278 days
(22)	Nitish Kumar [3]	Member of Bihar Legislative Council	22 February 2015	20 November 2015	2001 days
			20 November 2015	Incumbent				16th Assembly (2015–20) (2015 election)

See also

• List of Governors of Bihar
• List of Deputy Chief Ministers of Bihar

Notes and references

Notes

2. President's rule may be imposed when the "government in a state is not able to function as per the Constitution", which often happens because no party or coalition has a majority in the assembly. When President's rule is in force in a state, its council of ministers stands dissolved. The office of chief minister thus lies vacant, and the administration is taken over by the governor, who functions on behalf of the central government. At times, the legislative assembly also stands dissolved.[3]
3. On 15 November 2000, the new state of Jharkhand was carved out of Bihar.

References

1. Durga Das Basu. Introduction to the Constitution of India. 1960. 20th Edition, 2011 Reprint. pp. 241, 245. LexisNexis Butterworths Wadhwa Nagpur. ISBN 978-81-8038-559-9. Note: although the text talks about Indian state governments in general, it applies for the specific case of Bihar as well.
2. "Chief Ministers of Bihar". Bihar Chief Minister's website. Archived from the original on 19 March 2011.
3. Amberish K. Diwanji. "A dummy's guide to President's rule". Rediff.com. 15 March 2005.
4. "The Hindu : Nitish Kumar sworn in CM". www.hindu.com. Retrieved 3 April 2018.
5. https://www.indiatoday.in/magazine/nation/story/20000320-nitish-kumars-government-in-bihar-not-outvoted-as-much-as-outmanoeuvred-by-laloo-yadav-777236-2000-03-20