opinion | Challenges before new cabinet ministers
A day after the cabinet reshuffle, background-scoring trolls on social media were raising questions, doubts and doubts even before the new ministers took charge. Some trollers questioned the castes of the new ministers, some scoured old tweets posted by the new ministers and compared them with their predecessors. There were baseless speculations about why senior ministers were dropped in the reshuffle.
There was a lot of curiosity on social media about the new Railway, Communications and Information Technology Minister Ashwini Vaishnav, who is a Rajya Sabha MP from Odisha. Vaishnav is a former IAS officer. He was the vice president of Siemens and later became an entrepreneur before venturing into politics. He also worked in the office of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
There was speculation on social media that his predecessor Ravi Shankar Prasad was asked to step down due to the ongoing issue with Twitter. There was also speculation whether Vaishnav would take a compromising approach towards Twitter. Soon after taking over as the IT minister, Vaishnav said, “Everyone has to follow the law of the land. All the people living and working in India have to follow the rules of the country. The new minister’s message was loud and clear. His reply was to a question on why Twitter was reluctant to comply with the new IT rules framed by the government for social media.
Ashwini Vaishnav has no previous experience of handling ministries and has not been a Member of Parliament for a long time. But Prime Minister Modi has given him the charge of three important ministries- Railways, Information Technology and Communications. A former bureaucrat, he did exemplary work in Odisha as the District Collector of Cuttack and Balasore during the cyclone.
Bihar Jan Adhikar Party leader Papu Yadav made several tweets: “Poor Ravi Shankar Prasad was crossing swords with Twitter to keep his boss happy, but his boss sacked him to keep American masters happy.” He also tweeted: “Ashwini Vaishnav was made Railway Minister for the auction of Indian Railways. His appointment is clearly a conflict of interest. He was the MD of GE Transportation which supplied material to the Indian Railways. He had set up two companies in Gujarat which need to be investigated.
Most of the tweets by trolls and opposition leaders were neither factual nor relevant. Vaishnav has already made the government’s policy quite clear on Twitter after taking charge. His remarks come at a time when the Delhi High Court has directed Twitter to appoint three of its top executives within two weeks under the new IT rules.
Following the High Court’s order, the Supreme Court refused to stay the Delhi High Court’s direction. Twitter had sought eight weeks to appoint new officers. Twitter has agreed to comply with the new IT regulations and has already appointed an interim chief compliance officer. It has also promised to appoint a nodal officer and chief grievance officer.
Pappu Yadav’s remarks about the new minister are expected to toe the line of the American social media giant in the face of these latest developments. Ashwini Vaishnav had met his predecessor Ravi Shankar Prasad and sought his advice on Thursday before taking charge.
Those who were carrying the misconception that Ravi Shankar Prasad’s departure was due to pressure from Twitter, they do not know the working style of Prime Minister Modi. Modi never comes under pressure, but yes, he is always careful about the image of his government. Ashwini Vaishnav has worked as an IAS officer in the government for 18 years. I have known him personally since 2003 when he was the Deputy Secretary in the office of the then PM Vajpayee. He also worked as personal secretary to Vajpayee.
Hailing from Jodhpur, Rajasthan, he was one of the blue-eyed officers in the government of Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik. In 2008, he took study leave from service, went to Wharton to pursue an MBA, and then resigned from government service. He worked for multinational companies GE and Siemens. Then he resigned to become an entrepreneur.
Two years ago, BJP gave him a Rajya Sabha ticket from Odisha. During the election he got support from Naveen Patnaik’s Biju Janata Dal. I have heard his speech in Rajya Sabha and I can say that he is an effective speaker. He targeted the Congress while speaking on the Union Budget.
Had Ashwini Vaishnav not become a cabinet minister, people would have forgotten his speech. I think one should know the background of a person before assessing one’s abilities. We should give some time to Vaishnav to understand the working of their ministries and then assess their performance. If he makes a mistake, he should be criticized, but first give him a chance.
Comments like Vaishnav may be an American puppet and help Twitter simply because he studied in America are childish and irresponsible. And, to say that powerful US social media tools put pressure on the PM to remove Ravi Shankar Prasad is also baseless. It is because of Prasad that about 30 million objectionable posts were removed on Facebook and Instagram.
During the tenure of Ravi Shankar Prasad, many big multinational companies left China and came to work in India. According to my sources Ravi Shankar Prasad can be given a big responsibility in the party organization and he has already done so. Social media trolls will have to eat the crow if this happens.
New health minister Mansukh Mandaviya was trolled soon after taking oath. Trolls scoured his old tweets and pointed out spelling and grammatical mistakes in English. Screen shots of his old tweets from almost nine years old were in the news and he was made the object of ridicule. In his first press conference when a reporter told what the trolls were doing, Mansukh Mandaviya gave a good reaction. He said, ‘I have come here to work and I don’t have time to react to what others are saying.
The new health minister announced on the first day of his new job what steps the Center is taking to provide oxygen tanks in all district headquarters of India by December this year. In the face of a possible third wave of the pandemic, this is a colossal task that could happen.
Mandaviya announced a Covid infrastructure package of Rs 23,123 crore approved by the new Cabinet for emergency response to Covid-19. The package includes creation of more infrastructure in hospitals for pediatric care, reuse of hospital beds for COVID patients, strengthening of genome sequencing, increasing the number of ICU facilities, installation of oxygen tanks and measures to tackle the COVID pandemic. There is a provision for creation of buffer stock of essential major medicines. . Of the total outlay, Rs 15,000 crore will come from the Center and Rs 8,123 crore will come from the states. Mandaviya seems to be a man with a mission and he probably believes in this motto: ‘Mera Kaam Bolega’.
I personally feel that a person’s talent and ability does not depend solely on a person’s knowledge of the English language. Within 12 hours of taking over the health ministry, Mandaviya publicly outlined his plan for the next nine months.
There is no doubt that the country is facing a great challenge from the outbreak of COVID and the government has faced a lot of criticism due to the pandemic. With thousands of families grieving over the death of their loved ones, there are many questions and doubts in the minds of people whether the Center will be able to deftly deliver the expected third wave.
Will the situation recur during the second wave when people could not get medicines, oxygen, ICU ventilators and even hospital beds? What Mandaviya said on Thursday instills hope in our hearts and I hope the government will handle the third wave competently.
When Sports Minister Kiren Rijiju was appointed as Union Law Minister, social media trolls were out with their knives. He compared his knowledge of law with the legal skills of his predecessor Ravi Shankar Prasad, who had a good reputation in the courts of law as an influential lawyer.
I know Rijiju has done LLB from Delhi University but never practiced as a lawyer. By then he had entered politics in his home state of Arunachal Pradesh. on Thursday. Rijiju admitted that it was a “big challenge” for him. “Everything can be handled with proper guidance, understanding of the subject and application of the mind”, he said. The Ministry of Law plays an important role in the transfer, posting and promotion of Supreme Court and High Court judges and in improving the judicial infrastructure.
I think one of the nice advantages of having a vibrant social media is that common people now know a lot about their ministers and they see them speak. Kiren Rijiju was an able Minister of State in the Home Ministry, and did a good job when he was later given the charge of sports. Though hailing from the northeastern state of Arunachal Pradesh, he speaks fluent Hindi and is an able minister.
The Law Ministry, which now has to look after them, is facing the critical problem of increasing number of pending cases. There is a huge backlog in the appointment of judges. The judiciary has been complaining about the delay in the appointment of judges, while the Center maintains that the higher judiciary is taking time to process these appointments. The net result is that lakhs of litigants are facing problems due to large number of pending cases. Rijiju has to find a way.
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