Cabinet reshufflePM Modi sets off a mid-term course correction ahead of crucial Assembly polls

    10-Jul-2021
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Lakshmana Venkat Kuchi
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is right when he says that he is a lucky Prime Minister.
And most definitely he and his Government are lucky in that the crisis he faced on multiple fronts–economy and public health in the wake of pandemic–came in the middle of his second term unlike as in the case of his predecessor who got engulfed in a series of corruption allegations, a slowing economy, rising petrol prices that all combined to clobber the UPA Government at the fag end of its term. It had absolutely no time for the Government and Congress to change course from an electoral perspective. And it was then that there appeared a powerful and credible challenger in Narendra Modi.
So, Modi 2.0 faced problems somewhat similar to what Dr Manmohan Singh faced–minus the corruption charges as none of the Union Ministers in Modi’s Cabinet have been named in any scandal. Yes, on the performance front, many Ministers have been found wanting, and these failures threatened to bring down the image of the Government and even that of the Prime Minister.
Though PM Modi is still the most popular of all the political leaders in India, the Covid handling and especially during the second wave has brought the image of his Government and even his own popularity ratings down a bit. Enough to cause concern, and more so given the drubbing the BJP got in the recently held Assembly elections to five States.
Although going up from 3 to 77 MLAs in West Bengal is a stupendous achievement by any standards, in the case of the BJP it is seen as a defeat because of the hype and hope it had created in the run-up to the elections by running a high voltage campaign.
So, the mishandling of Covid–that brought international focus on India, the images of bodies floating in the river Ganges and the dead bodies emerging out of the sand on river banks, the collective cremation of several bodies together–and the vaccine issue that brought the Courts coming down heavily on the Government are issues that could have damaged any Government. Needless to say, the BJP leadership and PM Modi realized the problem area and it is their luck that the dispensation faced these problems two and half years before the Lok Sabha general elections.
This has given PM Modi the time and chance to carry out a mid-term course correct, and even if meant obliquely admitting mishandling of the Covid pandemic that led to some avoidable deaths. The complete overhaul of the Cabinet and Council of Ministers is exactly an exercise in weeding out the deadwood and non-performers. The strong leader that Modi is, gives him that much of a free hand needed to get a team that he feels comfortable with.
The one strong message that has gone out to his own Ministerial colleagues–through the dumping of those considered heavyweight Ministers like Ravi Shankar Prasad or Prakash Javdekar–is “perform or perish”. This is reinforced in the sacking of the two Health Ministers, apparently for mishandling the public health crisis, even if this meant giving a handle to the Opposition to attack the Government with on the handling of the pandemic.
Yes, the Cabinet reshuffle and induction of new Ministers is also for political reasons, given the crucial elections to Uttar Pradesh Assembly coming up, along with few other States. So for sure, the Prime Minister wanted to send out signals to the electorate of Uttar Pradesh by inducting seven Ministers from the State. The complex calculations of balancing castes, class, and regions too were worked out to present a representative Cabinet with most regions of the country finding a place in the Union Council of Ministers.
Yes, south India, in general, presents the BJP with a problem in that it does not have too many MPs from these States to play with. This is why, representation from Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, and even Kerala to some extent, is a problem that the party can do little other than induct a party leader and bring him through the Rajya Sabha route.
But, four Ministers from Karnataka, the BJP’s gateway to South India, is to reward the State that sent many BJP MPs to the Lok Sabha. More important, Karnataka is witnessing an intense tussle within the BJP with dissident voices seeking the ouster of Chief Minister BS Yeddyurappa, and the reshuffle is also expected to smoothen some ruffled feathers in the State. But overall, the overhaul of the Cabinet and Council of Ministers have come at a time when the BJP has realized the need to course correct, and just in time for it to recalibrate its policies and programmes that can help it in the general elections in 2024.
It is in this context that we need to see the induction of new talent in key business ministries–Narayan Rane for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, Sarbananda Sonowal for Posts, Shipping, and Waterways, Ayush, Jyotiraditya Scindia for Civil Aviation, Bhupendra Yadav for Labour and Employment, Ashwini Vaishnaw for Railways, Communications, Electronics, and Information Technology, Rajiv Chandra-shekar for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, Electronics and Information Technology. This is a clear-cut message to the party and Government set up–the much needed rejig has been done and now it is time to step on the gas pedal.
Why Prime Minister Modi appears to be luckier, so far that is, given the absence of any challenger worth the name, given the hopelessly divided Opposition is he has, as some wit puts it, the best Opposition anyone can have.
But for the present, the reshuffle has been aimed at energizing the working of the Council of Ministers with the induction of new blood and more importantly, to strengthen the political ground in poll-bound States like Uttar Pradesh and even Maharashtra to take on the Shiv Sena. For Uttar Pradesh, the reshuffle plays the OBC card to take on the principal Opposition parties in the State. Four Ministers from West Bengal is an indication that the BJP has every intention to make Mamta Bannerjee sweat and also, give a chance to the party to consolidate on its major gains in the State.
Besides, the reshuffle has also made a point that the party leadership and the Prime Minister feel that there was no need for a change in leadership in Karnataka.
Lakshmana Venkat Kuchi is a senior journalist tracking social, economic, and political changes across the country. He was associated with the Press Trust of India, The Hindu, Sunday Observer, and Hindustan Times. He can be reached on [email protected] and Twitter handle @kvlakshman