Thursday, 08 July 2021 | PNS | New Delhi
In dropping four top level Union Ministers — Ravi Shankar Prasad, Prakash Javadekar, Harsh Vardhan, Ramesh Pokhriyal “Nishank” and eight other Ministers — Prime Minister Narendra Modi has sent clear signal that performance and perception were equally important for anyone to remain part of his set up.
Three of the four Ministers — except Nishank — had one thing in common: They were responsible for creating a very negative perception of India in the foreign media. Ravi Shankar Prasad seemed to have gone on a personal ego trip in trying to discipline the social media, while Javadekar failed as Information and Broadcasting Minister to reach out to the international press in way the Prime Minister would have desired.
To many Harsh Vardhan’s has been made a “scapegoat” saga, but the fact remains that he did leave India underprepared to deal with the second Covid-19 wave, inviting outrage across the globe .
Similarly, Labour Minister Santosh Gangwar also presided over a Ministry which failed miserably in tackling both the migrant crisis and unemployment issue during the Covid era and gave enough fodder to the foreign media to inflict heavy damage on the Modi Government.
The others axed a couple of hours before the oath-taking ceremony of new inductions, were Chemicals and Fertilisers Minister DV Sadananda Gowda, Labour Minister Santosh Gangwar, Minister of State for Education Sanjay Dhotre, Minister of State for Women and Child Development Debasree Chaudhuri, Minister of State for Jal Shakti Rattan Lal Kataria and Minister of State for Environment Babul Supriyo who took to social media sharing his resignation with a mention “asked to resign”.
Social Justice and Empowerment Minister Thaawarchand Gehlot had resigned two days earlier but then he was made Governor of Karnataka on Tuesday.
President Ram Nath Kovind accepted the resignations of 12 Union Ministers, a Rashtrapati Bhavan Spokesperson said.
In all, six Cabinet Ministers, one Minister of State (Independent Charge) and five Ministers of State have resigned.
Law and IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad’s resignation comes amid a row between micro-blogging platform Twitter and the Government over various issues, including compliance with the new IT rules. The resignations come after Prasad and Information and Broadcasting minister Javadekar announced sweeping regulations for social media firms like Facebook and Twitter, OTT players as well as digital media.
Javadekar also could not manage the bad publicity in the peak of pandemic and that when much had passed he took to social media to tackle the media untill the damage had been done.
The PM has reason to be unhappy with Prasad as Minister of Law and Justice, too. The judiciary, of late, has been highly critical of the Centre on several sensitive issue, and response of the Ministry has not been adequate, at least that is how experts feel.
Health Minister Vardhan, whose handling of the Covid-19 crisis had drawn flak from the Opposition parties had to resign as the Health Minister and also as the Science and Technology Minister. The Government and political sources said Vardhan’s comments in the middle of the crisis were slammed by many as insensitive and ignorant of the ground reality and that too all his energy were devoted in attacking the Congress leadership Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi.
Sources said Vardhan also failed in proper coordination between the medical research institutes like ICMR etc, vaccine manufacturers, and bringing embarrassment to the Government over frequent change in schedule of the Covid vaccines.
Pokhriyal, who tested positive for Covid-19 on April 21, was admitted to AIIMS bang on the day when the PM was to announce the cancellation of the secondary education board examinations after a week-long consultations held by Pokhriyal with the other stakeholders.
Modi showed his lack of confidence in Pokhriyal and thus a meeting between the Centre, States and Education Board was convened under the chairmanship of Defence Minister Rajnath Singh. Besides the PMO had a close watch on Pokhriyal’s day to day functioning like progress on implementation of National Education Policy, inordinate delay in appointments of Vice Chancellors and Directors of universities and institutions.
The unrest in universities like JNU, BHU, Hyderabad, Jamia Millia Islamia could not be handled independently and without the intervention of PMO.
Pokhriyal’ Deputy Sanjay Dhotre, who represents the Akola Lok Sabha constituency in Maharashtra, too has been dropped.
Incidentally, Gangwar was the first one to raise a voice against Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath questioning the mismanagement of the pandemic in the State and particularly his Lok Sabha constituency Bareilly. He had written a complaint letter to Yogi saying officials don’t take calls and Government health centres send back patients for ‘’referrals’’ from the district hospital.
Others big name dropped are Babul Supriyo (Environment, Forest and Climate Change) upon whom the party had put on major responsibility during West Bengal assembly polls which he also contested but lost. Gowda’s departure is also being linked to the pandemic as his ministry was responsible for making available essential drugs to fight off Covid-19.
