Modi sworn in as India PM with small team of ministers

BJP leader keeps pledge of minimum government with about two dozen fewer ministers than the previous Congress-led administration.

Narendra Modi greets the people after being sworn in as India’s new prime minister by the president, Pranab Mukherjee, left, at the presidential palace in New Delhi on May 26, 2014. Harish Tyagi / EPA

NEW DELHI // Narendra Modi was sworn in on Monday as the 15th prime minister of India, alongside a small, lean cabinet of ministers that embodies the first half of his promise of “minimum government, maximum governance”.

President Pranab Mukherjee administered the oath of office to Mr Modi and his cabinet at Rashtrapati Bhavan, the presidential residence. The ceremony drew 4,000 guests, making it the biggest ever prime ministerial inauguration. Past ceremonies have had a maximum of 1,500 guests.

Amid tight security, and watched by parliamentarians, the heads of state of several South Asian countries, party workers and celebrities, Mr Modi, speaking in Hindi, promised to “do right to all manner of people in accordance with the Constitution and the law, without fear or favour, affection or ill-will.”

The outgoing prime minister, Manmohan Singh, was in attendance, as was Sonia Gandhi, the president of the Congress party, which lost the election so comprehensively to Mr Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Rahul Gandhi, Ms Gandhi’s son and the vice president of the Congress, was present as well.

After Mr Modi was sworn in, only an additional 45 ministers – cabinet-rank as well as junior ministers of state – took the oath.

In contrast, the previous government, led by the Congress, had 29 ministers in its cabinet and an additional 12 outside the cabinet but in charge of various ministries. Along with the ministers of state, the total sometimes exceed 70.

Aakar Patel, a Bangalore-based political analyst, said the cabinet size reflected how Mr Modi liked to work. Even as chief minister of Gujarat state, “he put together a small team that he could work well with,” Mr Patel said. “He believes that others don’t have the drive that he does, so he’d rather do the work himself.”

Contrary to expectations, Mr Modi did not give himself charge of multiple ministries, as he did while chief minister of Gujarat.

Instead, he put other ministers in charge of clustered portfolios that, in previous governments, were served by different ministries. This has helped shrink the size of the cabinet.

For example, Ravi Shankar Prasad, formerly the deputy leader of the opposition in the Rajya Sabha, parliament’s upper house, will be in charge of both telecommunications and law ministries. Ram Vilas Paswan, leader of the Lok Janshakti Party in the BJP’s electoral alliance, will tend to the consumer affairs ministry as well as the food ministry.

Senior BJP leaders were given four prime posts in the cabinet.

Sushma Swaraj, who was the leader of the opposition in the Lok Sabha, parliament’s lower house, during the last government, will be India’s new minister of external affairs. Arun Jaitley, the previous leader of the opposition in the Rajya Sabha, will head the finance ministry as well as the defence ministry.

Rajnath Singh, the president of the BJP, was named home minister, contrary to Mr Patel’s expectation that Mr Modi would head the home ministry himself, as he did in Gujarat.

Mr Modi did, however, move a key part of the home ministry – the department of internal security – to the prime minister’s office.

No minister was named for the industry portfolio, suggesting the Mr Modi may retain it for himself, given the emphasis of his election campaign on rejuvenating the economy.

The new cabinet is a releatively young one – senior BJP leaders such as LK Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi did not make the cut because Mr Modi refused to include anybody over 75.

Throughout Monday, Mr Modi held short meetings with the leaders of the eight South Asian nations whom he had been invited to New Delhi for the inauguration. These included the Sri Lankan president Mahinda Rajapaksa and the Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif.

Srinath Raghavan, a senior fellow at the Centre for Policy Research, a New Delhi-based think tank, told The National that these meetings would be "useful for Modi and his team to get to know these leaders in person. After all, they'll have to start formulating foreign policy with these nations very soon."

Mr Sharif and Mr Modi will hold another meeting in Tuesday.

“Why not turn the similarities [between India and Pakistan] into our strength?” Mr Sharif told the NDTV news channel on Monday.

“I very much look forward to meeting Mr Modi. We should remove fears mistrust and misgivings about each other.”