Govt’s official list omits two junior ministers

PM Manmohan Singh retained them but the government's online list of central ministers dropped two ministers of state (MoS), S Gandhiselvan and D Napoleon, from the Prime Minister's team, Aloke Tikku reports.

PM Manmohan Singh retained them but the government's online list of central ministers dropped two ministers of state (MoS), S Gandhiselvan and D Napoleon, from the Prime Minister's team.

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Both are DMK MPs in the 78-member council of ministers. Gandhiselvan is the junior minister in the health ministry while Napolean is the MoS in the ministry of social justice.

But after Sunday's reshuffle, their names went missing from the government's only online list of ministers at www.india.gov.in.

Rajasthan MP Lalchand Kataria also didn't make it to this list despite being sworn in. And quite a few others who made it had portfolios at variance with what the PM had actually allocated.

Incidentally, the faux pas may have its origin in the struggle for the No. 2 position in the Singh cabinet that fell vacant when Mukherjee moved to Rashtrapati Bhavan in July.

The NCP wanted the honour to go to its chief, agriculture minister Sharad Pawar, while the Congress believed it should be retained and be held by defence minister AK Antony.

Caught in a bind, the Prime Minister's Office and the cabinet secretariat promptly pulled out the list of cabinet ministers from its websites.

So the PM's website has an icon - "PM's Team" - but all that you can see, if you click on it, is an old list of junior ministers. It was never stated but sources said the ministers' list prepared by the cabinet secretariat reflected the pecking order within the council.

The government's official portal, www.india.gov.in, had no such luxury. It was the world's window to India and its government. Sunday's reshuffle was the first occasion when the website managers tried to update the list on their own. And slipped.