Playing it his way
Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar, about a year-and-half into his tenure, finally effected the Cabinet reshuffle that had been talked about ~ and up ~ for a while earlier this week. As it turned out, it was more tinkering than shuffling.
Those looking desperately for political significance or to work out who’s in thick with the Chief Minister and who’s not so close were a disappointed lot. Apart from what can be argued was an addition of a “significant” so-called minor portfolio for two of his Cabinet colleagues’ remits ~ Francis D’Souza was given IT & NRI and Laxmikant Parsekar got Captain of Ports ~ the additional portfolios seem to have just been divvied up so all ministers got a little more work (presumably). The Chief Minister retains the Home, Mines, Vigilance, Agriculture, Finance, Education, Personnel and Housing departments.
This newspaper’s position is clear ~ that the composition and distribution of workload within the State cabinet is entirely in the executive domain and the Chief Minister as the executive head has an unalienable right to pick, shuffle or reshuffle his team as he deems best. But, given the Indian adoption of the Westminster model we follow, there are certain conventions that have usually been the benchmarks for such an exercise.
The first and perhaps most important of these is that the rewards system ~ that the most competent or best-performing ministers will get the most important (in terms of effective, good governance) portfolios has long since been thrown out of the window. Instead of “important”, the term most commonly used to describe heavyweight ministries/departments, is “lucrative” and it is not the best minister but s/he who is perceived to have the maximum heft in terms of social, caste or community support who is usually granted these departments. And that tells its own story, including of the crisis of the Cabinet system in the states and Central governments.
So, to that end, Parrikar’s courage in keeping a slew of important departments under his direct control must be appreciated. It is a political risk, no doubt, given that he will displease more than he can ever hope to please but at least there will be clear accountability in administration. Corruption and its twin, incompetence, have so often got buried under political exigencies or blunted by the drumbeats in favour of one minister or the other by their supporters that public cynicism about which minister lands which job, and why, is perhaps entirely appropriate.
Having praised Parrikar let us now not immediately proceed to damn him; but we should point out that the criticism of him as a non-delegator or “control-freak” will only increase after the Cabinet tinkering exercise he has just undertaken. The Chief Minister still has enough residual political capital to come through such attacks reasonably unscathed provided he ensures that it is indeed the best man who has got the best job.
