New Delhi: In the first massive cabinet reshuffle in the present Modi government, Dharmendra Pradhan was Wednesday made India’s new education and skill development minister and Mansukh Mandaviya was appointed the health minister while some senior ministers, such as Nitin Gadkari and Smriti Irani, were downsized.
Pradhan, not new to the cabinet, was earlier handling the petroleum and natural gas portfolio. However, Mandaviya, as Minister of State (MoS) with independent charge, was handling the shipping ministry. Being given the crucial health ministry along with the chemical and fertilizers portfolio, at a time when the country is bolstering its health infrastructure to tackle a possible future wave of Covid-19, is a big step up for the MP from Gujarat, considered to be close to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Mandaviya replaced Dr Harsh Vardhan, who came under flak for the inept handling of the Covid pandemic during the second wave. He is among the six cabinet ministers who were dropped in the reshuffle.
Among the other key elevations was that of Anurag Singh Thakur, an MP from Himachal Pradesh, who replaced Prakash Javadekar as Minister of Information and Broadcasting (I&B). Javadekar was dropped from the cabinet entirely. I&B is considered crucial given that it is responsible for managing the government’s perception on different fronts — be it the economy or handling the Covid pandemic. Thakur was earlier the MoS for finance and corporate affairs.
Kiren Rijiju, who was earlier the sports minister, was also given a cabinet rank as the new law minister, replacing Ravi Shanker Prasad, who was also dropped.
With this rejig, Modi now has 30 cabinet ministers, two MoS with independent charge and 45 MoS. In total, there are 78 members in the Council of Ministers, including the prime minister, up from 53. There are 36 new faces in the Modi cabinet now.
The 30 cabinet ministers and two MoS with independent charge will handle the 53 union ministries in the Government of India.
In the reshuffle, the government has also attempted to balance the caste equation with 27 ministers belonging to Other Backward Class (OBC) and 12 Dalits. Priority has also been given to accommodate leaders from the seven states going to the polls next year. Uttar Pradesh, where assembly election is due in February 2022, has got the maximum representation. Seven new faces from UP have been inducted into the cabinet including Anupriya Patel from Apna Dal, an NDA ally.
Also read: PM Modi’s new team is a governance reboot tempered with politics
Big 4 unchanged, ex-CMs get ministries
In a surprise move, first-time inductee Ashwini Vaishnaw, a Rajya Sabha MP from Odisha, was not only given a cabinet rank but three important portfolios — railways, communications and information technology. Vaishnaw is a former IAS officer of the 1994-batch Odisha cadre and was private secretary to prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2004.
Jyotiraditya Scindia, who was instrumental in bringing down the Kamal Nath government in Madhya Pradesh after he switched from the Congress to the BJP, was given the civil aviation portfolio.
BJP general secretary Bhupender Yadav, considered close to Amit Shah (who retained the home ministry portfolio), is another first-time cabinet minister. He will be handling the important labour portfolio, besides environment. Yadav replaces Santosh Singh Gangwar, who was dropped from the cabinet.
Former chief ministers Narayan Rane and Sarbananda Sonowal were given charge of the ministries of micro, small & medium enterprises (MSME) and shipping, respectively.
NDA alliance partners, the Janata Dal (United) and Lok Janshakti Party (LJP), were also given cabinet berths — JD(U)’s R.C.P. Singh was appointed the steel minister while LJP’s Pashupati Kumar Paras, Chirag Paswan’s uncle, is the new food processing industries minister.
The top four portfolios, though, remained unchanged — home affairs ministry will continue to function under Amit Shah, defence under Rajnath Singh, finance with Nirmala Sitharaman and external affairs with S. Jaishankar.
The only addition has been the newly created Ministry of Cooperation, which was given to Amit Shah as an additional portfolio.
Meanwhile, Piyush Goyal has been tasked with the twin ministries of commerce and consumer affairs. In addition, he will also handle the textile ministry. The railways ministry, though, was dropped from his charge.
Hardeep Singh Puri was elevated to a cabinet rank with the charge for both his earlier housing and urban affairs portfolio and now the petroleum ministry too.
The downsized
While 43 ministers were sworn-in, the reshuffle also saw some senior ministers lose their heft. Nitin Gadkari, who earlier also oversaw the MSME ministry, now has the single charge of the road transport and highways portfolio.
Smriti Irani also lost a ministry — textiles — but continues as the minister for women and child development. Sripad Yesso Naik and Prahalad Singh Patel who were MoS with Independent charge have been downgraded to just MoS now. While Naik has been given shipping and tourism portfolio, Patel will be handling Jal Shakti and food processing industry.
A government source told ThePrint that the changes were made to bring in synergies between ministries which have similar or overlapping domains. Silos between ministries aimed at achieving a common objective will be broken down and an efficient, whole-of-government approach will be enabled with the new work allocation.
For instance, the ministries of health and chemicals & fertilisers will now be handled by the same minister. A similar approach has been adopted in other domain ministries wherever such clubbing was feasible and necessary.
(Edited by Manasa Mohan)
Also read: Caste equations take centre stage as 7 from UP make it to Team Modi ahead of assembly polls