Giving India its first full-time woman defence minister is the big surprise from PM Modi’s Cabinet reshuffle

The biggest story of the day is undoubtedly the stellar and most laudable fact that India, for the very first time, has a full-time woman defence minister in Nirmala Sitharaman. Yes, by now the headlines have screamed from the rooftop how technically the glass ceiling has been breached for the first time because in former prime minister Indira Gandhi’s time, it was about the PM holding an additional portfolio that she had awarded herself.

In appointing Nirmala Sitharaman, formerly the MoS with independent charge of the commerce ministry, one of the top four Cabinet berths and a seat in the high table of the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS), Prime Minister Narendra Modi has sprung a huge surprise on everyone, while decisively shifting the narrative with the great Sunday rejig of the Union Cabinet.

The Union Cabinet reshuffle was of course looked forward to as an occasion to do a major surgical strike on the council of ministers itself, and speculations were rife with important resignations that happened on Friday, September 1. However, the rejig turned out to be one more magic trick with Sitharaman meteoric elevation into the country’s top four – Home, Finance, External Affairs and Defence – portfolios, that are most coveted and are often posited as male bastions. Of course, Sitharaman is the second woman to occupy a seat at the high table, given minister of external affairs Sushma Swaraj has long held the position with considerable dignity.

The elevation of Sitharaman aside, the Union Cabinet rejig also saw the induction of nine new ministers, as well as major reshuffle of portfolios.

Piyush Goyal is has been elevated to the Cabinet rank, and has been awarded the railway ministry, in addition to coal ministry. Suresh Prabhu, the former (and some would say derailment-dented) railway minister, has been shifted to the commerce ministry. Dharmendra Pradhan, the petroleum minister, has also been given the additional charge of skills development, while Smriti Irani’s position as the I&B minister has been cemented with the Cabinet reshuffle.

At a glance, the major names and their new portfolios are as follows:

Defence – Nirmala Sitharaman

Railways – Piyush Goyal (retained Coal ministry)

Commerce and industry – Suresh Prabhu

Skills Development – Dharmendra Pradhan (retained petroleum and natural gas)

Namame Gange and Water resources – Nitin Gadkari (retained road transport, highwyas and shipping)

Drinking water and sanitation – Uma Bharati

Mines – Narendra Singh Tomar (retained rural development, panchayati raj)

The nine new ministers at MoS rank include:

Shiv Pratap Shukla – Finance.

Raj Kumar Singh – Power, New and renewable energy.

Hardeep Singh Puri – Housing and Urban affairs.

Ashwini Kumar Chaubey – Health.

Virendra Kumar – Women and child development, Minority Affairs.

Ananth Kumar Hegde – Skills development.

Satyapal Singh – Human resource development, Water resources, Ganga rejuvenation.

KJ Alphons – Tourism, Electronics, Information technology.

Gajendra Singh Shekhawat – Agriculture

Other MoS with independent charge are as follows:

Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore – Youth Affairs and Sports (also is MoS, I&B).

Giriraj Singh – Micro, small and medium enterprises.

Santosh Kumar Gangwar – Labour and employment.

The response to the Cabinet reshuffle has been mostly euphoric, particularly the reaction to the elevation of Nirmala Sitharaman as the defence minister.

Overall, the Cabinet reshuffle has seen positive vibes from the public sphere and social media. However, many did point out how the decisions were made keeping the 2019 Lok Sabha polls in mind, and were clearly political in nature, in the service of shifting the narrative that of late seemed to have been slipping away from the Narendra Modi government, particularly after the fallout of the demonetisation results.

For example, it was important to come across as the woman-centric regime, given the flak the Centre has received over its submission against criminalising marital rape in the court. Similarly, it was significant for the government to show it was serious about fixing the railways mess and removing Suresh Prabhu from the ministry and allocating it to the competent minister in Piyush Goyal was aimed at addressing this big gap in governance.

The tagline for the Cabinet reshuffle – “The power of 4P: Passion + Proficiency + Professional + Political Acumen for Progress” – can be read as the Modi government heavily relying on former bureaucrats to head ministries with significant governance deficit, as well as in keeping with Modi’s own entente with bureaucrats and technocrats themselves, rather than ministers or politicians per se.

The elevation of Sitharaman in this light is both a testament to her competence as well as her absolute loyalty to PM Modi over various issues, particularly her defence of the indefensible demonetisation diktat. Evidently, this is the “New India” that PM Modi in interested in pushing forward, and the leadership rejig is the first step towards his political and governance goal that goes via 2019.

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