PM sets up cabinet committees on jobs, investments

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has constituted two new cabinet committees to address the biggest challenges facing the new government – flagging economic growth, and rising unemployment.

The Cabinet Committee on Investment & Growth will be chaired by the Prime Minister and will have Home Minister Amit Shah, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari and Railway Minister Piyush Goyal as members.

The 10-member Cabinet Committee on Employment and Skill Development will have Shah, Sitharaman, Goyal, Agriculture and Rural Development Minister Narendra Singh Tomar, HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal, Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, Skill Development Minister M N Pandey, Labour Minister Santosh Kumar Gangwar and Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Hardeep Singh Puri as members.

Besides, the Prime Minister also constituted the Cabinet Committee on Security that has Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, Home Minister Amit Shah, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar as members.

Sitharaman will be the only woman minister in the CCS. The CCS of the previous government had two woman members – Sitharaman, the then Defence Minister and the then External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj.

The Opposition has kept up the attack on the Modi government on issues of sluggish economic growth, rising unemployment, agrarian distress and increasing non-performing assets of public sector banks.

The National Sample Survey Report (NSSO) on jobs, released last week, had revealed the worst kept secret of the previous Modi government – unemployment rate at this highest in the last 45 years.

India’s economic growth rate slowed to five-year low of 5.8% in January-March 2018-19, due to poor performance in agriculture and manufacturing sectors, the Central Statistical Office had revealed last week.

Inputs from the two committees would prove handy for Finance Minister Sitharaman when she presents the Union Budget on July 5.

The government is yet to constitute Appointments Committee of the Cabinet, Cabinet Committee on Accommodation, Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs, Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Affairs and the Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs.