New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to reshuffle and expand his cabinet today to inject fresh talent, give wider representation to states and ease pressure on some ministers.
Sources said 16 new names will be included in the cabinet.
This will be the first cabinet reshuffle since Modi took power in May after leading the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to a historic win in the Lok Sabha election.
Goa Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar, who resigned yesterday, is widely tipped to become the new defence minister, divesting Finance Minister Arun Jaitley of one of his portfolios.
BJP sources said Parrikar may be inducted into the Rajya Sabha from Uttar Pradesh, where the party has 71 of the 80 Lok Sabha members.
Today’s event will take place before the start of parliament’s winter session on November 24, giving time to the new ministers to familiarise themselves with the working of their ministries.
Bandaru Dattatreya from Telangana and Sujana Chowdary from Andhra Pradesh are likely to be inducted into the union cabinet.
Dattatreya, a national vice president of the BJP, is a Lok Sabha member from Secunderabad.
Chowdary belongs to the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and is a Rajya Sabha member from Andhra Pradesh.
Dattatreya is the lone BJP parliamentarian from Telangana and his inclusion will give representation to the newly created state in the union council of ministers.
Chowdary, a businessman, is a first-time parliamentarian and is considered close to TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu.
Among the other names doing the rounds are J P Nadda (Himachal Pradesh), Jayant Sinha (Jharkhand), Ram Kripal Yadav and Girirraj Singh (both from Bihar), Vijay Sampala (Punjab), Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Niranjan Jyoti (both from Uttar Pradesh), Sanwar Lal Jat (Rajasthan) and Birender Singh (Haryana).
The name of former union minister Suresh Prabhu is also on the list. However, his party Shiv Sena did not appear happy about it yesterday.
Modi is believed to be keen to induct Prabhu — whose performance in critical ministries in the NDA-I had been praised by all parties — and may give him the railways portfolio.
“We have many more experienced and deserving MPs who need to be encouraged. The party is not clear how this will come (Prabhu’s inclusion in the cabinet) from our (Shiv Sena) quota. We are still discussing it and will finalise the decision shortly,” a Shiv Sena leader told IANS, requesting anonymity.
Babul Supriyo, a singer-turned-politician from West Bengal, is also expected to be in the list, with West Bengal BJP president Rahul Sinha saying Modi had called Supriyo and informed him of the decision to make him a minister.
Olympic medallist Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore also appears to be on the list, according to the sources.
The Modi government now has 22 cabinet members and 22 ministers of state, some holding independent charge.
Many ministers, including Arun Jaitley, Nitin Gadkari, Prakash Javadekar, Nirmala Sitharaman and Piyush Goyal, hold multiple ministries.
IANS
