Job Security Among Modi’s Ministers at an All Time High!

Anyone who says PM Modi is not doing his bit to combat unemployment need look no further than his Cabinet, where job security is at an all time high! Recognising the endemic mismatch of skills to portfolios in the BJP, the PM has adopted a zero-tolerance policy to resignations, although he is beginning to ease up on restrictions regarding assuming moral responsibility.
Magic Bullet Suresh Prabhu managed to kill 277 people in his two years as Railways Minister. How could he have possibly known putting off hiring 1.42 lakh safety staff would cause 346 accidents, out of which only 28 were major? Like his trains, the minister was good enough to go off the beaten track and assume full moral responsibility, although the PM has asked him to wait and not to bother handing in a resignation. After all, the media will soon run out of steam.
States take on their leader’s characteristics. Haryana, under CM Khattar, has gotten “Khattarnak” for the third time since the 14 day Rampal standoff and 10 day Jat reservation agitation. BJP has decided to be lenient towards the novice CM and first time MLA Khattar, for whom lessons on basic crowd management to implement Section 144 are proving too hard. Following the CBI court’s conviction of his guru Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh for rape, the disheartened CM allowed law and order to lapse as 50,000 incensed followers stockpiled arms, killing 30 people and injuring 235. The CM is likely to be marked safe.
UP CM Yogi Adityanath was let off the hook for not noticing that over 100 children were dying for want of oxygen and overcrowding at the very government hospital he was inspecting in his constituency Gorakhpur. A political culture of incompetence breeds company, it would seem, as the authorities knowingly procured industrial, not medical, oxygen from a supplier that was 350 kilometers away who wasn’t even licensed to produce oxygen for human consumption! The Prime Minister termed it a national calamity that the poor Yogi could not maintain a state of mindfulness while having to also conduct rigorous “hateriotism tests” at Madrassas and oversee healthcare at the same time.
It is no secret once you make it to the Home Ministry like Rajnath Singh, even three strikes can’t get you out. Rajnath sailed through Sukhma where 25 CRPF jawans were killed in a Maoist ambush. Ever the optimist, Rajnath sees the bloodbath as a sign of success of his security operations. He talked his way out of resigning even when it took him four entire days to neutralise the six terrorists infiltrating Pathankot Airbase, despite 50,000 troops being based in the area. He and his MoS Rijuju warmed their seats even as the Manipur blockade continued for 130 days. Ignoring NDA ally Conrad Sangma’s letter urging a Berlin-style airdrop of essential commodities, Minister Singh deployed the Air Force to help print new notes instead and re-monetise India, while PM Modi promised to intervene in the humanitarian crisis if and only if BJP were voted into power.
Maharashtra Women and Child Development Minister Pankaja Munde got herself in and out of a sticky situation in the Chikki Scam, where it is alleged she cleared purchases of over 206 crores in a single day without tenders.
MP CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan is rather better than Munde at cleaning up his crime scene in the Vyapam admissions and recruitment scam, where 23 individuals connected with the case died under mysterious circumstances. He managed to hold onto his position even as his violent police crackdown on protesting farmers resulted in the death of six. Little wonder BJP is maintaining a deathly silence against calls for his resignation.
While the Panama Papers brought down three-time Pakistan PM Sharif, in Modi’s temple of democracy Raman Singh remains CM in Chattisgarh to recover his margins by playing the Public Distribution System.
External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Rajasthan CM Vasundhara Raje continue to be the Modi Sarkar’s brand ambassadors despite holding the diplomatic escape hatch open for Lalit Modi who was found guilty of administrative and financial irregularities. Swaraj secured a passport for Lalit on the humanitarian grounds that he employed her husband and daughter, and Raje even went so far as to tell British Immigration he was in need of asylum!
Job security is definitely at an all time high in Modi’s Cabinet.
