Politics | Modi’s team of ministers outlines new government’s focus

By effecting a 40 per cent change in the composition of his team of ministers after the Lok Sabha polls, Prime Minister Narendra Modi may have shown that he would harbour less patience and wield greater authority for getting results in the second tenure of his government.

As the huge mandate has placed immense expectations on his deliverables, Modi will ensure that things get done in the government by persons whom he thinks are right for the job. Unlike the first tenure when paucity of talent haunted his choices, Modi has shown that there is a serious intent on his part to make do with men and women who he thinks can bring early results on issues of governance.

This approach goes beyond just installing Amit Shah as home minister in his debut role in the Union Cabinet, or moving Nirmala Sitharaman from defence portfolio to take charge of finance.

Rajnath Singh’s shift from the home ministry to the defence ministry was largely the result of Modi placing responsibility on Shah to deliver on BJP’s set of promises on improving the internal security situation by better, efficient and modern policing to begin with, followed by ways to deal with contentious but crucial issues (for BJP) such as Article 370, checking illegal migration through border states and stamping out terrorist modules.

Speculations centred on Shah getting either the finance or home portfolio. Business circles were surer of Shah being in the finance ministry than elsewhere as they counted on his tenacity for hard work and details to set right ills plaguing the economy. However, Modi felt Sitharaman was the best person to handle matters in place of Arun Jaitley who had opted out on health grounds.

It was not without significance that Modi chose to drive down to call on ailing Jaitley a day before the PM’s new team took oath of office. Jaitley is understood to have shared with the PM his views on possible successors who could carry forward whatever he had left behind.

After discussions with Jaitley, Modi appears to have narrowed his choice of having someone who would understand without loss of time the demands of the current economic situation and not be subject to any outside influence, and tackle the demands of the job — without any eyebrow being raised.

Modi made Sitharaman India’s first full-fledged woman defence minister and chose to bestow the honour of being the country’s first full-fledged woman finance minister too. However, she would have work hard to deliver on poll promises, arrest the slowdown and boost both consumption and investment.

Her first budget, on July 5, would have to be the government’s first vision statement, reflecting its ambitions for the next five years. She would have to oversee further simplification of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) with lesser rate slabs, address the liquidity woes of the non-banking finance companies (NBFC) sector, and on the whole, boost demand.

Modi’s decision to shift Singh from home portfolio to defence was no less challenging. With an annual budget of more than Rs 4 lakh-crore, the ministry of defence has had a host of issues to grapple with — including a call on restructuring the 1.3 million-strong Indian Army, inducting critical military equipment and usher in a new concept called the integrated battle groups.

Singh will need to push the MoD to move faster on acquiring six new submarines, 400 fighter jets for the Indian Air Force, 57 jets for the Navy, 800 helicopters for the Army, Navy and IAF, new warships and unmanned aerial platforms. Defence PSUs have been plagued by indigenous R&D issues and production programmes that cause only acquisition delays.

Sitharaman was already tackling these issues on a priority basis but Singh may have to show more political will and skills in the transformation of his ministry.

Modi’s choice of S Jaishankar, the former foreign secretary, as his new external affairs minister came as a big surprise. It was one name that has won wide acclaim and acceptance as the perfect candidate to replace Sushma Swaraj who did not contest the Lok Sabha elections. In the three years that he was foreign secretary, Jaishankar helped navigate Modi’s diplomacy, including the critical face-off with China at Doklam in Bhutan in 2017. After Modi became Prime Minister, Jaishankar, then India’s ambassador to the United States, oversaw Modi’s passage from a decade-long visa ban on him by the US to a popular leader who won respect and attention from the White House.

Today, India’s ties with the US are again strained by a host of problems, including Washington’s decision to withdraw the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) status given to India, ban on purchase of Iranian oil, defence equipment from Russia and telecom equipment from China.

On the positive side, Jaishankar understands Modi’s desires better than anyone to put the India-US relationship on a firm footing while balancing ties with China and Russia. Modi’s trust in Jaishankar has grown over the years.

What about other men and women in Modi’s team?

The return of Nitin Gadkari as road and surface transport minister, Piyush Goel as railway, and commerce minister, Smriti Irani as women and child development, and textiles minister, Ravi Shankar as law and justice, communications and IT minister were on the expected lines.

Interestingly, Modi found Narendra Singh Tomar as his best bet to be agriculture minister who will handle an integrated agriculture and rural development ministry, tasked with modernising agriculture, ending distress among farmers while doubling their income. A surprise entry was that of former Uttarakhand chief minister Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ as HRD minister who has his task more than cut out. Education is one area where Modi’s attention has hitherto been seen as wanting focus because of serious challenges ahead.

Listing 75 milestones that India will achieve till 2022, when the nation celebrates 75 years of independence, Modi had got the BJP to make a slew of announcements in the 2019 manifesto — ranging from a pension scheme for traders to promises to make an investment of Rs 25 lakh-crore to improve the productivity of the farm sector.

These milestones broadly cover seven areas — agriculture, youth and education, infrastructure, railways, health, economy, good governance, inclusive development, women and cultural heritage.

One presumes Modi’s selection of 24 Cabinet ministers, nine ministers of state with independent charge and 24 ministers of state has a lot to do with implementing these milestones, which are crucial for the BJP’s continued electoral success. Ministries have been told take the milestones as targets and work out day-by-day plan.

Allies within the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) have only got token representation, thanks to BJP’s huge mandate. Given this, an ally such as Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has preferred to not accept a ‘symbolic’ presence at Modi’s high table. In picking some leaders from the states of West Bengal, Kerala, Maharashtra, Jharkhand and Haryana (the last three states go to assembly polls in November), Modi has also sent a message about BJP’s political priorities.

Shekhar Iyer is former senior associate editor of Hindustan Times and political editor of Deccan Herald. Views are personal.