In the last two days, the resignations from the ministers had started slipping in forming the base of the major overhauling that the PM was aiming at in his ministers.
There were some expected and few unexpected resignations that created ripples in not just the political circuit but also took people in general by surprise.
Currently, the Union Cabinet now has 77 members, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The cabinet has 43 new faces, while seven ministers of state have been promoted and given cabinet rank.
Ahead of elections in some states in the country, majorly Uttar Pradesh, the re-shuffle may make sense to the political brains.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is also in charge of the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions; Department of Atomic Energy; Department of Space; all important policy issues, and all other portfolios not allocated to any Minister.
Surprise checkouts
Out of 12 ministers who resigned from their posts hours before the shuffle as a surprise include senior leaders like IT and Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar and Education Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank.
Exiting or dropping Dr Harsh Vardhan, Union Health Minister, post the deadly pandemic is being looked at as the corrective measure and no tolerance policy of the PM for the lack of performance of the ministry of Health under the leadership of Dr Harsh Vardhan. It also could be regarded as a significant move of the PM to reassure the country with better health services and preparedness before the expected third Covid wave.
Major portfolio shift
Ministry of Health goes to Mansukh Mandavia, Jyotiraditya Scindia gets the Civil Aviation Ministry, Ashwini Vaishnaw, a bureaucrat-turned-politician, is the new Railway Minister.
Home Minister Amit Shah has been given charge of the newly-created Ministry of Cooperation.
Piyush Goyal: Minister of Commerce and Industry; Minister of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution; and Minister of Textiles, Dharmendra Pradhan gets the portfolios of Education Ministry and the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship. Anurag Thakur is allotted Sports & Youth affairs and I&B ministry.
Kiren Rijiju gets Law and Justice and the Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas and Housing and Urban Affairs Minister comes to Hardeep Singh Puri. Sarbanand Sonowal to be Shipping, Ports and Waterways minister. He also got the Ayush Ministry. Nisith Pramanik: Minister of State in the Ministry of Home Affairs; and Minister of State in the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports.
Dr Munjapara Mahendrabhai: Minister of State in the Ministry of Women and Child Development; and Minister of State in the Ministry of AYUSH. Chauhan Devusinh becomes the minister of State in the Ministry of Communications.
The seven ministers of state promoted are Anurag Thakur, G Kishan Reddy, Paroshottam Rupala, Kiren Rijiju, Hardeep Singh Puri, Mansukh Mandaviya and Raj Kumar Singh.
Apart from this, key Union Cabinet Ministers Rajnath Singh, Nirmala Sitharaman, S Jaishankar, Narendra Singh Tomar retain their portfolios of Defence Ministry, Finance Ministry, External Affairs Ministry and Agriculture Ministry, respectively.
Other portfolio distribution
- Bhupendra Yadav: Labour ministry
- Meenakshi Lekhi: MoS External Affairs.
- Narayan Tatu Rane: Minister of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises
- Smriti Irani: Ministry of Women and Child Development (WCD)
- Dr. Virendra Kumar: Minister of Social Justice and Empowerment
- Ramchandra Prasad Singh: Minister of Steel
- Pashu Pati Kumar Paras: Minister of Food Processing Industries
- Bhupender Yadav: Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change; and Minister of Labour and Employment
- Pankaj Choudhary: Minister of State in the Ministry of Finance
- Anupriya Singh Patel: Minister of State in the Ministry of Commerce and Industry
- Prof. S P Singh Baghel: Minister of State in the Ministry of Law and Justice
- Rajeev Chandrasekhar: Minister of State in the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship; and Minister of State in the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology
- Shobha Karandlaje: Minister of State in the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare
- Bhanu Pratap Singh Verma: Minister of State in the Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises
- Darshana Vikram Jardosh: Minister of State in the Ministry of Textiles; and Minister of State in the Ministry of Railways
- Meenakashi Lekhi: Minister of State in the Ministry of External Affairs; and Minister of State in the Ministry of Culture
- Annpurna Devi: Minister of State in the Ministry of Education
- A Narayanaswamy: Minister of State in the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment
- Kaushal Kishore: Minister of State in the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs
- Ajay Bhatt: Minister of State in the Ministry of Defence; and Minister of State in the Ministry of Tourism
- B L Verma: Minister of State in the Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region; and Minister of State in the Ministry of Cooperation
- Ajay Kumar: Minister of State in the Ministry of Home Affairs
- Bhagwanth Khuba: Minister of State in the Ministry of Finance
- Kapil Moreshwar Patil: Minister of State in the Ministry of Panchayati Raj
- Pratima Bhoumik: Minister of State in the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment
- Dr. Subhas Sarkar: Minister of State in the Ministry of Education
- Dr. Bhagwat Kishanrao Karad: Minister of State in the Ministry of Finance
- Dr. Rajkumar Ranjan Singh: Minister of State in the Ministry of External Affairs; and Minister of State in the Ministry of Education
- Dr. Bharati Pravin Pawar: Minister of State in the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare
- Bishweswar Tudu: Minister of State in the Ministry of Tribal Affairs; and Minister of State in the Ministry of Jal Shakti
- Shantanu Thakur: Minister of State in the Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways
- John Barla: Minister of State in the Ministry of Minority Affairs
- Dr. L. Murugan: Minister of State in the Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying; and Minister of State in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting
