Title - Punjab rewarded with three key portfolios

New Delhi : The latest expansion of the Union Council of Ministers has brought rewards for Punjab in terms of key portfolios. Ashwani Kumar has got Law and Justice, Pawan Bansal has been given charge of the Railways, while Manish Tewari has got Information and Broadcasting.Perhaps the best-kept secret over the last few days was the allocation of Law and Justice portfolio to Ashwani Kumar, who has been quietly working in the government both as a minister in Planning and Science and Technology. Considering that the Law and Justice Ministry is entrusted to senior politicians as also the criticality of its role in the current political context, his appointment indicates the trust reposed in him both by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Congress president Sonia Gandhi and an endorsement from Rahul Gandhi. For someone who practised as a senior advocate in the Supreme Court and served as the youngest Additional Solicitor General in 1990s, Ashwani Kumar should know the intricacies of the ministry. He assumes charge at a critical time when the UPA government faces challenges that will play out in the coming days.

In Parliament, he will be responsible for piloting critical legislations and for restoring the institutional communication between the political executive and higher judiciary. A slew of Bills to check graft remain in the works with the stalled Lokpal Bill being on the top of the agenda.

He will also have to ensure that a fine balance is maintained between independence of judiciary and talk of having an effective mechanism to address judicial aberrations. The debate on the National Judicial Commission and the Judicial Accountability Bill, are some proposed steps in that direction that he is expected to steer.

Shifting of Pawan Kumar Bansal to an important ministry like Railways assumes significance in more ways than one. For the first time in the UPA’s tenure, the ministry is with the Congress and by appointing the Chandigarh MP, the government and the party put immense faith in his ability to deliver.

The Railways is facing both legacy issues and effects of economic slowdown, the challenge is to turn it around. CP Joshi, who held temporary charge after Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress quit, started the correction process and Bansal would have to work to restore Railways back to its health.

Ludhiana MP, Manish Tewari will be at the helm of Information and Broadcasting Ministry. With explosion of news and television networks, the 47-year-old minister has the envious task of overseeing an industry that is expanding without boundaries while grappling with problems of state-run media.

Having been the spokesman of the Congress for past four years, defending the party and the government under difficult circumstances, Tewari has been baptised by fire but that is just a portion of the task ahead.

From among those in the region, Chandresh Kumari Katoch, who earlier represented Himachal Pradesh and now Jodhpur gets Culture, to which she can bring both grace and sensitivity in dealing with the subject.