New Delhi:The reshuffle in the union cabinet under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi has seen 36 new faces holding various professional degrees. The new cabinet looks promising with two are former IAS officers, eight lawyers, four doctors, four MBA degree holders and several engineers. The inclusion of highly qualified members, apart from addressing regional and community aspirations in the new cabinet, is an an effort to reboot the government midway through its term.
Ashwini Vaishnaw, who has been handed the ew responsibility of Railways as well as Ministry of Communications and Information is a former IAS officer of the 1994 batch. The 50-year-old officer also holds an MBA degree from the prestigious Wharton School, Pennysylvania University and an MTech from IIT Kanpur. During his 15 years' tenure as an IAS officer, Vaishnaw handled key responsibilities and was particularly known for his contribution to the Public Private Participation framework in infrastructure.
In 2004, Vaishnaw was appointed as Vajpayee's private secretary after the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) lost the 2004 election. Another IAS officer who has made his way into Modi's new cabinet is Ramchandra Prasad Singh, originally hailing from Bihar's Nalanda district. Bureaucrat-turned-politician Singh, a Rajya Sabha MP from Bihar, is serving his second term as the parliamentarian. He came in the good books of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar in the late 1990s when the then Samata Party leader was the Union Railway Minister and Singh was on a central deputation. The retired 63-year-old officer made his political debut in 2010 foraying into the Rajya Sabha as a JD(U) leader.