JP MP Nirmala Sitharaman greets PM Narendra Modi and party leaders Rajnath Singh and Amit Shah at the swearing-in ceremony of new Union government, at Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi.
Credit: PTI Photo
Among the 72 council of ministers in the new Modi government, there are only five minority faces. The figure, however, is better in comparison to 2019, when there were just four minority faces throughout the various reshuffles, including Harsimrat Bada, who left the NDA in September 2020. Notably, there is no Muslim face in the Modi 3.0 government.
Moreover, only seven women have made it to the council of ministers, including two cabinet ministers — Nirmala Sitharaman and Annapurna Devi. This is down from the 12 women who were at the helm of affairs in different ministries throughout the last five years.
The five ministers from minority communities who took oath on Sunday are Kiren Rijiju and Hardeep Puri, both cabinet ministers, and ministers of state Ravneet Singh Bittu, George Kurien and Ramdas Athwale. This means that minority representation in the council stands at 5 per cent.
There is, however, a slight improvement in the minority representation than the previous government. In 2019, there were four minority faces namely, Rijiju, Puri, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Harsimrat Badal. Naqvi resigned in 2022 while Badal's party, Shiromani Akali Dal, left the NDA in 2020.
Women representation has dipped from 12 to 7. Apart from Sitharaman and Annapurna, five women are now ministers of state. They are former ministers Anupriya Patel and Shobha Karandlaje, in addition to new faces Raksha Khadse, Savitri Thakur and Nimuben Bhamaniya. This means that gender representation of this council of ministers stands at 9.7 per cent.
In the 2019 Cabinet, Sitharaman, Smriti Irani and at one point Harsimrat Badal occupied Cabinet positions. Besides, there were nine ministers of state – Niranjan Jyoti, Shobha K, Pratima Bhaumik, Anupriya Patel, Meenakshi Lekhi, Renuka Saruta, Bharti Pawar, Annapurna, Darshana Jardosh.
The last Modi government had passed the Nari Shakti Adhiniyam Act, making it mandatory for 33 per cent reservation for women in Parliament. The implementation of the Act, however, will take place after the delimitation process, which is set to take place in 2026.