As Gujarat Chief Minister and then as Prime Minister, Narendra Modi does not reshuffle his Cabinet or change portfolios of the Ministers frequently. During Modi’s first term, he reshuffled his Cabinet only twice.

This is his first Cabinet reshuffle after returning to power in 2019. Going by this trend and given that Modi gives enough time to his Cabinet colleagues to showcase their performance, the next reshuffle is likely only after two yearsSo the next two years is crucial for expediting policies and programmes. Governments in their term’s last year consolidate the gains made to showcase it to the voters.

Five ideas

There are at least five ideas that usually go into the constitution of a ministry and the allocation of portfolios.

The first idea is to create omnibus Ministries, where all closely related Ministries can be brought under a single Ministry. More State Ministers can be assigned to this omnibus Ministry to share the work load.

For instance, the Ministry of Transport can include the Ministry of Roads and Highways, Railways, Ports and Waterways. But have these omnibus Ministries become more functional? Unfortunately, no. Either the entire Ministry functions under the government like Railways or there are too many PSUs under a Ministry like Heavy Industries. The paradox is that the Union government needs more ministries and, hence, ministers now to achieve the goal of minimum government and maximum governance in a decade or two.

The second idea is without merging ministries, the ministries with linkages may be assigned to a cabinet minister to synergise the outcoemes. Two apparently distinct ministries having strong linkages such as Health & Family Welfare and Chemicals & Fertilisers may be assigned to a Minister as it has now being done in the case of Manshukh Mandaviya.

However, identifying ministries with close linkages is easier said than done. For instance, Railways or Civil Aviation can be linked with the Tourism Ministry. The Ministry of Culture can also be linked with the Tourism Ministry. The Coal Ministry can be linked with the Railway or Power and Steel Ministry as coal is integral to the functioning of all these Ministries.

Also AYUSH should have been given to the Minister looking after Health rather than clubbing it with a Minister who is in-charge of Ports, Shipping and Waterways.

The third idea is that if the Prime Minister considers a candidate competent but inexperienced, she may be made Minister of State with one Ministry with independent charge to prove her mettle and another ministry as a subordinate to a Cabinet minister. Modi has been trying this for the last seven years.

The fourth idea is how much a Cabinet minister can chew, when multiple portfolios are allotted to them. Assigning more than two Ministries to a Cabinet minister or Minister of State may impact governance. The ministers, especially Cabinet ministers and their secretaries spend more time on day-to-day issues and firefighting than on generating ideas.Also implementation of the policies and programmes of their respective ministries too take a lot of time.

There are at least two Cabinet ministers, one with Railways, Communications and Electronics and Information Technology and the other with Commerce and Industry, Textiles, Consumer affairs, Food and Public Distribution, who have been given multiple ministries.

The fifth idea is whether there is a need for a separate Ministry Disinvestment like the one during Vajpayee’s regime. Given that the government’s disinvestment’s effort has been hindered by the Covid pandemic, the next two years on this front are crucial for the government.

Will bringing the Department of Public Enterprises under the Finance Ministry speed up disinvestment? No, as PSUs span across ministries and there are many ministries like Defence and Railways, where the production units function directly under the ministry and not as PSUs. The process of converting the production units into PSUs and then disinvesting them is a long winding one.

Given this, entrusting disinvestment to the Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (DIPAM), although under the larger umbrella of the Ministry of Finance is not a good idea as it requires a dedicated political executive committed to disinvestment.

The first reshuffle by the Modi 2.0 attempted to put these ideas into practice in a partial manner. It was also a big expansion with 77 ministers, leaving four vacant berths for the government to accommodate.

Even now it is not too late for the Prime Minister to fine-tune the redistribution of portfolios and create the Ministry of Disinvestment which is crucial for mobilising resources and achieve the long-term goal of ‘Minimum Government, Maximum Governance’.

In that process, it may not be a bad idea if the Prime Minister has to accommodate a couple of more ministers within the upper limit of 81 berths.

The writer is a public policy analyst

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