Union Cabinet expansion to take place today

The much-awaited reshuffle and expansion of the Union Council of Ministers will take place today and some new faces are expected to be inducted while few Ministers likely to be dropped.

President will administer the oath of office and secrecy to the new Ministers at a function in Rashtrapati Bhawan at 11 AM. At present, there are 64 ministers in the Council including the Prime Minister Narendra Modi and as per the Constitution, the numbers can go upto 82.

Meanwhile, BJP MPs S S Ahluwalia, Vijay Goel, Purushottam Rupala, Mansukhbhai Mandavia, Anil Madhav Dave, M J Akbar, Arjun Ram Meghwal and Anupriya Patel of Apna Dal and Ramdas Athawale of RPI among others met BJP President Amit Shah in New Delhi. These leaders are most likely to find a place in the expanded Cabinet.

BJP MPs from poll bound UP are expected to find sizeable berths. There is also a vacancy in the Council of Ministers after Sports Minister Sarbananda Sonowal became the Chief Minister of



Assam.

NDA ally Shiv Sena is also likely to get berth in the expansion. Top portfolios of Home, Finance, Defence and External Affairs are unlikely to be touched but some ministers may get promotion. Induction of young faces and performance of present Ministers will be taken into consideration by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP Chief Amit Shah while finalizing the list of new Ministers .

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said that the Cabinet expansion will reflect the focus of the Budget and priorities of the NDA government.They are minimum government for maximum governance, expeditious clearance of office files, improving ease of doing business, reduced time for Cabinet note finalisation and government no longer working in silos.

He dismissed the impression that economic growth in the country will be jobless saying focus is on creating more jobs in retail sector. Prime Minister said a model law in this regard has already been cleared by the Union Cabinet.