Modi shuffles portfolios of 2 key ministers

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi reshuffled the portfolios of two of his key ministers on Monday night.

He "temporarily" assigning the Finance Ministry and Corporate Affairs ministry to Piyush Goyal due to the indisposition of Finance Minister Arun Jaitley who underwent a kidney transplant surgery and divested controversial actress-turned-politician Smriti Irani of the Information and Broadcasting Ministry.

Modi allotted the Information and Broadcasting portfolio to Minister of State (independent charge) Col (Retd) Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore, an Olympic medallist shooter, who has been MoS in the ministry since November 2014.

Irani has been in the thick of a series of controversies ever since she was inducted into the Modi cabinet in November, 2014.  She had been holding Information and Broadcasting ministry as an additional portfolio since July 2017 and retains her Textile portfolio.

The Finance and Corporate Affairs portfolio for Goyal, who is a chartered accountant by training, will be in addition to his main charge of Railways and Coal Ministries, an official communiqué issued on Monday night said.

Though officially described as a "reallocation of portfolios", the exercise indicated the growing importance of Goyal in the Modi ministry. Goyal is among a handful of ministers considered efficient and go-getters.