DHAKA: Nine new ministers on Sunday (September 03) took oath in fresh Cabinet reshuffle in India, while four were promoted as Cabinet ministers, reports Indian media.
The Narendra Modi government brought the reshuffle in the Cabinet for third time after Narendra Modi took charge as Prime Minister. This was done as part of a strategy to accelerate reforms and improve governance ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
Six ministers had resigned to make way for the new faces; sources said they were sacked over performance.
Among the nine new union ministers, four former top bureaucrats joined Narendra Modi’s Cabinet. They are former IFS officer and highly decorate diplomat Hardeep Singh Puri, former IAS officer and DDA chief KJ Alphons, former union home secretary RK Singh and former Mumbai police chief Satya Pal Singh.
Bihar MP Ashwini Kumar Choubey, MP from Uttar Pradesh Shiv Pratap Shukla, MP from Madhya Pradesh Virendra Kumar, MP from Karnataka Ananthkumar Hegde and MP from Rajasthan Gajendra Singh Shekhawat are the other new ministerial joinees’ in the Modi government.
The four ministers who were elevated to the Cabinet are Nirmala Sitharaman (Commerce and Industry), Piyush Goyal (Coal, Power and Renewable Energy), Dharmendra Pradhan (Petroleum and Natural Gas) and Mukhtar Abbas Navi (Parliamentary Affairs and Minority Affairs).
All four were ministers of state with independent charge. It was not immediately known whether their portfolios will change along with their promotion. The portfolios of the nine new ministers who took oath are also expected to be announced shortly.
The promotions of Sitharaman, Pradhan, Goyal and Navi are seen as a reward for their performance across key ministries over the last three years and piloting critical reforms in an uncertain social and economic environment.
The cabinet reshuffle has been carried out on the “4P” principle “passion, proficiency, professional and political acumen”, aimed at delivering on Modi’s vision of “New India” by 2022, the 75th anniversary of India’s independence- an idea he had first flagged in March in an address to party workers at the BJP’s headquarters in Delhi.
BDST: 1350 HRS, SEP 03, 2017
EHJ
