Some were amazed, some dazzled, others surprised!
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s new cabinet saw many new faces, including his close confidant and BJP chief Amit Shah and former diplomat Dr Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, among many others–who have however contributed their bit and have come up the ladder hard way.
Shah, who took oath as cabinet minister for the first time, was allocated the crucial home ministry on Friday.
Emerging victorious from hard fought electoral battles over the past five years, Shah, as party president, has made the BJP an untiring and a successful organisation. Under his stewardship, the BJP has posted impressive victories elections in various states and returned to power at the Centre.
Former foreign secretary S Jaishankar, who was also India’s ambassador in Beijing and Washington, made a surprise entry and was allotted the responsibility as new external affairs minister.
Jaishankar had served as foreign secretary in the Modi government from January 2015 to January 2018 and was instrumental in heralding truce between Indian and Chinese troops face-off at Doklam in 2017.
Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’, former Uttarakhand chief minister, was given the portfolio of human resource development ministry, considered much prestigious, especially from the RSS point of view.
Pokhriyal, who won from Haridwar, was the chief minister of Uttarakhand from 2009 to 2011. Another former chief minister Arjun Munda of Jharkhand also found berth as the new tribal affairs minister.
Munda who was attracted to politics since teenage, got involved in the Jharkhand movement in the early 1980s, demanding a separate state for tribals to be carved out of Bihar’s southern, mineral-rich region.
Kailash Choudhary from Rajasthan took over as minister of state in the ministry of agriculture and farmers welfare while Debasree Chaudhuri took over as minister of state in the ministry of women and child development. Chaudhuri represents Raiganj Lok Sabha constituency in West Bengal. She defeated Kanaia Lal Agarwal of TMC, Mohammed Salim of CPI(M) and Deepa Dasmunshi of Congress.
A lawmaker from Karnataka, Pralhad Joshi, 56, who won a fourth consecutive term from Dharwad, was inducted as cabinet minister and given the charge of ministries of parliamentary affairs; coal and mines, while Angadi Suresh Channabasappa, a four-time member of Lok Sabha from Belgaum Lok Sabha constituency, became minister of state in the ministry of railways.
Ambala lawmaker Rattan Lal Kataria became minister of state in ministry of jal shakti and ministry of social justice and empowerment, while Dibrugarh MP Rameswar Teli secured his berth as minister of state in the ministry of food processing industries. (UNI)
