Indian government reshuffles cabinet, inducts 8 ministers

The Indian government Monday reshuffled its cabinet, inducting eight new Ministers, with barely a year to go for the general elections. Indian President Pranab Mukherjee sworn into office four cabinet ministers and four junior ministers at a function in his official residence, Rashtrapati Bhawan, in the national capital. Senior Congress leader Oscar Fernandes has become the new roads and highways minister while popular women leader Girija Vyas got Housing and Urban Development and Poverty Alleviation Ministry. Sis Ram Ola is the country's new labor minister and K.S. Rao the textiles minister. The ministers of state include Manikrao Gavit, Santosh Chowdhury, J.D. Seelam and E.M.S. Natchiappan, who got Commerce and Industry, Finance, Social Justice and Empowerment Ministry, and Health and Family Welfare Ministries, respectively. The reshuffle came just a day after the Indian president accepted the resignations of two senior ministers -- Ajay Maken, who held the Urban Development and Poverty Alleviation Ministry, and C.P. Joshi, who was in charge of the Railway Ministry. Maken has been made a senior office bearer of the ruling Congress party. Experts say the cabinet reshuffle is possibly the last before the 2014 polls and part of an attempt by the scam-tainted Congress party to rejig its image.