Eleven days after it ousted the AAP to end its 27-year exile from power in the Capital, the BJP Wednesday named 50-year-old Rekha Gupta, the newly-elected MLA from Shalimar Bagh, as Chief Minister of Delhi.

A first-time legislator, Gupta will be administered the oath of office Thursday with six other ministers at the Ramlila Maidan. The composition of the Council of Ministers, sources said, will have “adequate representation” from each of the city’s prominent castes and community groups, including a leading Sikh face.

In first remarks after being named CM, Gupta, who was said to have topped the list of “young and organisationally-experienced leaders in the party” prepared by the BJP brass in consultation with the RSS over the last week, said, “I thank our Central leadership, Prime Minister Modi, all our MLAs for this responsibility.”

Accompanied by the party’s central observers Ravi Shankar Prasad and O P Dhankar and others, Gupta met Lt Governor V K Saxena and staked claim to form the government.

An advocate by profession, Gupta, who will be Delhi’s fourth woman Chief Minister, is an old RSS hand who had joined the Sangh’s student wing, the ABVP, and was elected DUSU president in the 1990s.

She will also be the fourth BJP CM since the creation of the Delhi Legislative Assembly in 1993 – contesting the Assembly elections for the first time, she defeated AAP’s Bandana Kumari from Shalimar Bagh by more than 29,500 votes.