On Thursday, May 30, 2019, newly elected Prime Minister NarendraModi picked his cabinet ministers for the 17thLokSabha. The Union Cabinet comprises 24 ministers. A glittering swearing-in ceremony was held at the forecourt of the RashtrapatiBhavan which was attended by 8,000 guests comprising politicians, businessmen and celebrities.
Here is a list of Prime Minister Modi’s cabinet ministers and their portfolios:
Prime Minister Modi’s Cabinet Ministers
1. Narendra Modi: The 14th Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi was recently elected for a second term with a resounding mandate. Before he took office on May 26, 2014, as Prime Minister, he was the Chief Minister of Gujarat for three years.
Portfolios: Prime Minister
Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions
Department of Atomic Energy
Department of Space
2. Rajnath Singh: Formerly President of the BharatiyaJanata Party, Rajnath Singh won the recent national elections and has been inducted into the Modi government as Union Defence Minister. He has held several prestigious positions in Indian politics, but most significantly he was Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh from 2000 to 2002.
Portfolio: Ministry of Defence
Amit Shah: Seen as the key strategist to the recent elections, Amit Shah contested from Gandhinagar constituency where he won by a margin of more than 5.5 lakh votes. In 2014, he became party president of the BJP. Under his leadership, the BJP is the world’s largest political party.
Portfolio:Ministry of Home Affairs
3. Nitin Gadkari: He began his career in politics by being a member of the ABVP. In 1995, he was the PWD Minister in the Shiv Sena-BJP government. During his tenure, he built Mumbai’s first expressway from Mumbai to Pune. In 2009, he was made the president of the BJP and in the 2014 elections; he was the Union Minister for Transport. He won the recent elections from his constituency, Nagpur.
Portfolios: Ministry of Road Transport and Highways
Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises
DV Sadananda Gowda: A returning minister in the Modi government, Gowda won the 2014 and 2019 elections from Bengaluru North constituency. He had previously handled various ministries including law and justice, railways and chemicals and fertilizers. In 2011, he was CM of Karnataka.
Portfolio: Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers
4. Nirmala Sitharaman: Rising from the ranks in the BJP, Nirmala Sitharaman has occupied various plum positions such as national spokesperson of the BJP, Minister of State, Ministry of Finance, among others. In the previous Modi government, she held the position of Union Defence Minister. She is India’s second female defence minister.
Portfolio: Ministry of Finance
Ministry of Corporate Affairs
Ram Vilas Paswan: He has completed eight terms in the Lok Sabha and one in the Rajya Sabha. In 2014, he was Minister of Consumer Affairs, and Food and Public Distribution. He fought and won the elections from his constituency, Hajipur in Bihar.
Portfolio: Ministry of Consumer Affairs
Ministry of Food and Public Distribution
5. Narendra Singh Tomar: Yet another minister who returns to the Modi cabinet. Tomar has helmed a series of ministries in the previous government, such as steel, labour and employment, mines and rural development. In 2014, he won the election from Gwalior and in 2019 from Morena.
Portfolio: Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare
Ministry of Rural Development
Ministry of Panchayati Raj
6. Ravi Shankar Prasad: A Supreme Court advocate, Prasad was inducted into the Modi government 1.0 as Union Minister of Law and Justice and Minister of Electronics and Information Technology. He has held similar portfolios in Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s government too. He fought the elections from Patna Sahib in 2019, defeating his rival Shatrughan Sinha by 2,85,000 votes.
Portfolios: Ministry of Law and Justice
Ministry of Communications
Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology
7. Harsimrat Kaur Badal: Leader of the Shiromani Akali Dal party, Badal was Union Minister of Food Processing and following the 2019 elections, has been re-inducted into the government. She represents the Bhatinda constituency.
Portfolio: Ministry of Food Processing Industries
8. Thaawar Chand Gehlot: One of Modi’s cabinet ministers who won for the second consecutive time. Gehlot has won the elections and finds a berth in this government. He was Minister of Social Justice and Empowerment in the previous government, representing the Shajapur constituency.
Portfolio: Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment
9. Dr. Subrahmanyam Jaishankar: With an illustrious career in the diplomatic services, Jaishankar retired as Foreign Secretary. A Padmashree awardee, he served as ambassador to China and the US and High Commissioner to Singapore and the Czech Republic. He is now one of Modi’s cabinet ministers as Minister of External Affairs.
Portfolio: Ministry of External Affairs
Ramesh Pokhriyal 'Nishank': A poet-politician, Pokhriyal was the chief minister, Uttarakhand, from 2009-11. In 2019, he won the Haridwar constituency for the second consecutive time.
Portfolio: Ministry of Human Resource Development
10. Arjun Munda: A famous tribal leader and three times chief minister of Jharkhand, Munda has occupied various positions of importance in his home state, including that of national general secretary of the BJP. He won the 2019 elections from his constituency Khunti and finds a berth as one of Modi’s cabinet ministers.
Portfolio: Ministry of Tribal Affairs
11. Smriti Irani: Known for her eloquence, Irani has helmed several portfolios such as textiles, HRD and Information and Broadcasting. She was trounced in the Lok Sabha elections of 2004 and 2014, and in 2019, has had the distinction of defeating Rahul Gandhi in his bastion, Amethi.
Portfolios: Ministry of Women and Child Development
Ministry of Textiles
12. Dr. Harsh Vardhan: A doctor by profession, Vardhan is the only MP from Delhi to be given a berth in the Modi cabinet. In the 2014 government, he was the Minister of Health and Family welfare and later also helmed the ministries of Science and Technology and Earth Sciences. As health minister of Delhi in 1994, he successfully carried out the Pulse Polio programme for immunizing children against polio.
Portfolios: Ministry of Health and Family Welfare
Ministry of Science and Technology
Ministry of Earth Sciences
13. Prakash Javadekar: A member of Modi’s 1.0 cabinet, he returns to take charge of the HRD ministry. He worked as MoS for Environment with independent charge, and additionally served the Information &Broadcasting ministry and eventually made cabinet minister, HRD.
Portfolios: Ministry of Environment
Ministry of Forest and Climate Change
Ministry of Information and Broadcasting
14. Piyush Goyal: A chartered accountant by profession, Goyal held various portfolios in the previous term, particularly Finance. As Railways Minister, he is credited with announcing the first bullet train in India and transformed the power sector due to which 18,000 villages could be electrified.
Portfolios: Ministry of Railways
Ministry of Commerce and Industry
Dharmendra Pradhan: Representing the BJP in Odisha, Pradhan is a returning member to this cabinet. He served as Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas in the previous government and popularized the Pradhan MantriUjjwalaYojana.
Portfolios: Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, Ministry of Steel
15. Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi: Minority Affairs Minister in the previous government, Naqvi represents minority matters and is credited with having made sweeping reforms in the Haj policy.
Portfolio: Ministry of Minority Affairs
16. Prahlad Joshi: This is his fourth win from Dharwad in Karnataka. He has been a Lok Sabha member since 2009.
Portfolios: Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs
Ministry of Coal, Ministry of Mines
17. Dr. Mahendra Nath Pandey: A Minister of State in the HRD ministry, 2016-17, Pandey played a huge role in bringing victory to the BJP in the assembly elections of 2017. He was the chief of the BJP in Uttar Pradesh.
Portfolio: Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship
18. Arvind GanpatSawant: MP of Mumbai South from 2014-19, Sawant defeated MilindDeora and wrested this seat in the recent election.
Portfolio:Ministry of Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises
19. Giriraj Singh: In 2014, he was made Union Minister of State, Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises. In 2014, he won the Nawada constituency seat and in 2019 from Begusarai, Bihar.
Portfolio: Ministry of Animal Husbandry, Dairying and Fisheries
20. Gajendra Singh Shekhawat: BJP leader and Minister of Jal Shakti, Singh defeated VaibhavGehlot and won the Jodhpur LokSabha seat. Earlier, he was Minister of State for agriculture.
Portfolios: Ministry of Jal Shakti
Conclusion
Apart from 25 of Prime Minister Modi’s cabinet ministers who were sworn in at the ceremony, nine Ministers of State (Independent charge) and 24 Ministers of State were also sworn in.