A sacrificial effort has been made to cover up the failures of leading departments like Education, Health, Information and Broadcasting, Law, Labour, Social Justice and Environment. As a damage control exercise, the Ministers of the departments concerned were forced to resign before the new Ministers were inducted in the new Union Cabinet. In another shrewd move, some of the blue-eyed ministers like Dharmendra Pradhan and Piyush Goel have been shunted from their original ministries. 

On the Governance front, if the PMO has been the deciding factor, and a centre of policy formulation of all ministries, how will the change or reshuffle have any impact? Experts say, in a scenario where all the principal secretaries are reporting to the PMO directly, how will the change impact the governance with the rail coaches having changed but the engine remaining the same? 

It is learnt that the leadership has carried out a month-long review of the Ministers and their departments before coming to this conclusion. If non-performance was the criteria, why hasn’t the axe fallen on the departments like Finance -- where the economy is on the verge of collapse; Defence -- owing to the tensions on China border; and Agriculture – facing crisis due to farmers’ protests. Nirmala Sitharaman, Rajnath Singh and Narendra Singh Tomar should have been the first ones to go.

Health Minister Harsh Vardhan, Information Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, Education Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal “Nishank” and Chemicals and Fertilisers Minister D V Sadananda Gowda were among the 12 Union Ministers who had put in their papers before the Cabinet reshuffle. Vardhan, whose handling of the COVID-19 crisis, among a devastating second wave that saw citizens struggle for oxygen and healthcare facilities, had drawn flak from all quarters. Vardhan, a doctor himself, had been in charge of the health ministry as well as the science and technology ministry when the COVID pandemic broke, and then India worked to develop vaccines. 

Unfortunately, as the Health Minister, an MBBS doctor with vast experience has been replaced by a Veterinary science student of the Gujarat Agricultural University Mansukh Mandaviya. Did Vardhan pay the price for issuing a notice to Baba Ramdev, who spoke ill against Allopathy doctors? Or, has he been made the scapegoat for the bad handling of the pandemic? 

Ravi Shankar Prasad was spearheading the government’s new IT rules for which the government is at loggerheads with Twitter. Prakash Javadekar’s departure was also unexpected, given he was also the government’s spokesperson. In the recent past, a lot of international activists on climate change had written to him on various issues. Thaawarchand Gehlot was lucky to be sworn in as the Governor of Karnataka before the reshuffle. Pokhriyal, who tested positive for COVID-19 on April 21, was admitted to AIIMS in June following post-Covid complications. He resigned from his post citing health reasons. The former Uttarakhand Chief Minister took charge as the HRD Minister in May 2019.

During the first Covid wave, Gangawar wrote an open letter in favour of the migrant labourers facing the ire of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Adityanath Yogi. The Labour Ministry even failed to provide a realistic estimate of the returnees. Gowda failed to club the demand and supply of medicines and drugs as per the need of market during the second wave. Debasree Chauduri, Sanjay Dhotre, Rao Saheb Dhanve Patil, Ashwini Chaube, Ratan Lal Kataria, Babul Supriyo and Pratap Chandra Sarangi followed. The last time as many Cabinet members were dropped was in 1963 during the Kamraj plan. 

A number of key portfolios -- including health, law, information and technology and railways -- have gone to new ministers and junior ministers who were elevated in the Council of Ministers that underwent a reboot. The total strength of the Ministry is now 78, including the Prime Minister.

The current reshuffle has boosted the number of Cabinet Ministers from 21 to 30 and the number of junior ministers from 23 to 45. There are fewer junior ministers with independent charge -- the figure has dropped from nine to two.
At least 43 ministers, new and old, from the BJP and its allies were administered oath for the Union Cabinet on Wednesday. The new Union Cabinet will have seven PHDs, three MBAs, thirteen lawyers, six doctors, five engineers, seven civil servants and 68 with graduate degrees.

A lot of effort has been made for ensuring that the marginalised communities get adequate representation in the reshuffle. The new Cabinet will have 12 ministers from the Dalit community. Each of these ministers is from a different SC community. Two of them will have Cabinet rank. 

There will be a record 27 OBC ministers from 19 backward caste communities, including Yadavs, Kurmi, Jat, Darji, Koli and Vokkaligas. Five members of the OBC community will have Cabinet rank. There will be eight tribal ministers from seven ST communities.
There are five ministers representing various minority communities. At least 29 ministers will represent other communities like Brahmin, Bhumihar, Kayasth, Kshatriya, Lingayat, Patel, Maratha and Reddy castes. There are 11 woman ministers, including two with Cabinet rank.

There are 14 ministers below the age of 50, including six in the Cabinet. After the reshuffle, the average age of ministers will be 58 years. The new look Team Modi carries vast administrative experience. There are 46 ministers with experience of being ministers in state governments. At least 23 ministers have been MPs for three or more terms, and have more than a decade of Parliamentary legislative experience. There are four ex-chief ministers in the new Cabinet. The MPs who are part of the new Cabinet are from 25 states and union territories. As many as 16 Ministers are from Uttar Pradesh alone.

To facilitate synergy, the Union Ministries of health and chemical and fertilisers were brought under one ministry to help fighting Covid-19. Similarly, the Union Ministries of education and skill development and entrepreneurship were clubbed to work in unison. Ashwini Vaishnaw, an IITian from Kanpur with an International MBA, will handle the ministry of railways and the ministry of communications, electronics and information technology.

It is not fair to take all the credits for oneself and pass on the blame to various ministers. The Prime Minister himself monitored the covid drive and visited the vaccine-producing centres, leaving aside the Health or Chemical Ministers. All the accolades cannot be credited to one and the punishment to others. Earlier, the PM visited several countries without even the knowledge of Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj. Only time will reveal the fact that the recent Cabinet reshuffle was a cover-up of governance failure or a damage control exercise. Is it preparedness for the forthcoming state elections or the next Lok Sabha elections? The experiment to handle the Education Department is still in progress, starting from Smriti Irani to Prakash Javedkar to Nishant to Dharmendra Pradhan. Hope the bug stops here!