Suresh Gopi gets Tourism, Petroleum; Minority Affairs for George Kurian

NEW DELHI: The portfolio allocation for ministers in the third Narendra Modi government has been completed. Thrissur MP Suresh Gopi has been made Minister of State in two departments. Suresh Gopi has been given the portfolios of Tourism and Petroleum. Meanwhile, the main leaders of the BJP have retained the most important portfolios without making any big changes. George Kurian has been appointed Minister of State for Minority Affairs, Animal Welfare and Fisheries.

As Gajendra Singh Shekhawat is the Minister of Tourism and Hardeep Singh Puri is the Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas, Suresh Gopi's work will be associated with both of them. George Kurian's work will be associated with Minority Affairs Minister Kiran Rijiju and Dairy, Animal Husbandry and Fisheries Minister Lalan Singh. Both of them will take charge today.

Amit Shah will remain as the Home Minister, Rajnath Singh as the Defense Minister, Nirmala Sitharaman as the Finance Minister and S. Jaishankar as the Minister of External Affairs. Although the allies of BJP had staked a claim for the post of Railway Minister, BJP's Ashwini Vaishnaw will continue as Railway Minister. Apart from this, he has been given the additional charge of the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting. BJP national president JP Nadda has been given the Health Department.

Nitin Gadkari will remain as the Road Transport and Highways Minister. Among other ministers of the second PM Modi government who retained their posts were Hardeep Puri (Petroleum and Natural Gas), Piyush Goyal (Commerce and Industry), Dharmendra Pradhan (Education), and Sarbananda Sonowal (Ports, Shipping and Waterways).

Former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan will be the Agriculture and Rural Development Minister, and former Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar will be the new Housing and Urban Affairs and Power Minister. The first cabinet meeting of the third Modi government was held this evening. While Kiren Rijiju has been transferred to the Parliamentary Affairs Department, Jyotiraditya Scindia, who was the Aviation Minister, has been transferred to the Telecom Department.

From the allies, TDP's Kinjarapu Rammohan Naidu got Civil Aviation, Janata Dal-Secular's H. D. Kumaraswamy Heavy Industry and Steel, HAM-S's Jitan Ram Manjhi is the new MSME Industry Minister, Janata Dal-United's Rajiv Ranjan Singh alias Lalan Singh, got the portfolios of Panchayati Raj, and Fisheries, Animal Husbandry, and Dairying, and Lok Janshakti Party-Ram Vilas chief Chirag Paswan is the Minister for Food Processing Industries.