(1) New coalition government takes charge under PM Modi
Narendra Modi, newly sworn in for a third straight term, named a Cabinet on June 10 that retained his top ministers in crucial portfolios despite the nationalist party losing their majority in a shock election result. There was no change in the top four ministries.
S. Jaishankar, who spearheaded the country’s foreign policy for the last five years, was handed back his position as the External Affairs Minister. Amit Shah to continue as India’s Home Minister, Nirmala Sitharaman as the Finance Minister, Nitin Gadkari retains Road Transport and Highways, and Rajnath Singh remains to be the Defense Minister.
India’s six-week-long election came to an on June 4 in which incumbent Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) failed to secure a majority on its own after it won landslide victories in 2014 and 2019. However, his National Democratic Alliance (NDA) coalition won enough seats to form the government, with him at the helm. This is the first time the BJP under Modi has needed support from its regional allies to form a government after a decade of commanding the majority in the Parliament.
Final election results showed BJP won 240 seats, well below the 272 needed for a majority. Together, the parties in the NDA coalition secured 293 seats in the 543-member lower house of parliament.
On June 9, Modi and 71 ministers took the oath of office at India’s presidential palace, Rashtrapati Bhavan, in New Delhi. 61 of them were from the BJP while the remaining were BJP’s NDA allies. Only seven of them were women, and not a single one from the Muslim community, the largest minority group in India.
(2) Pawan Kalyan named Deputy CM in Chandrababu Naidu govt
Jana Sena Party (JSP) president Pawan Kalyan has finally made it to the Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly, being made the Deputy Chief Minister by Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu on June 14. He has also been allocated the Panchayat Raj, Rural Development & Rural Water Supply, Environment, Forest, Science & Technology ministries. He won Pithapuram Assembly constituency with a margin of more than 70,000 votes.
Mr. Naidu was also sworn in as Chief Minister of residual Andhra Pradesh for the second time. This is the fourth time that Mr. Naidu will be serving as Chief Minister in his more than four decades of political career. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, former Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Medical and Health Minister and the BJP National president JP Nadda, and a host of VVIPs attended the ceremony.
Mr. Naidu has allocated ministries to his 24 Cabinet colleagues, take a look at the Cabinet below:
Mr. Naidu is likely to hold the first meeting of the Council of Ministers on June 18 while the first session of the newly-formed Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly is likely to be held on June 19, according to the sources at the Secretariat.
(3) Mohan Charan Majhi retains Home, Finance in Odisha
Veteran BJP MLA Mohan Charan Majhi was sworn in as the 16th Chief Minister of Odisha on June 12. He is the third tribal Chief Minister after late Hemanand Biswal and Giridhar Gamang since Odisha became a separate State in 1936. He retained portfolios of Finance, Home, General Administration, Water Resources, and Information and Public Relations.
K. V. Singh Deo, six-time MLA from the Patnagarh Assembly constituency, and Prabhati Parida, first-time Nimapara MLA, also took oath of office. The two leaders will serve as Deputy Chief Ministers in the State’s first BJP government.
As many as 16 BJP MLAs had sworn in as Ministers. Of 16 Ministers, 11 members including CM and two DCMs, are holding Cabinet rank while five are Minister of State for independent charge.
(4) Indians in Kuwait and Gulf countries
Around 46 Indians were killed in a massive fire that erupted in a building in Kuwait’s southern district of Al-Mangaf. A total of at least 49 migrant workers were killed in the fire that broke out in an apartment building in Al Ahmadi Governorate early on Wednesday. At least 50 other people were injured in the incident.
Indians have a significant presence in Kuwait, and the two countries have historically enjoyed cordial relations. In fact, the Indian rupee was legal tender in Kuwait for over a century until 1961. Currently, almost a million NRIs live in Kuwait, making it the largest expatriate community in the country.
The charts below showcase the population of Indians in Kuwait and how over a third of migrants in Kuwait are Indians. 56% of NRIs reside in the six countries representing the Gulf Cooperation Council. 2.4% of all the inward remittances to India come from Kuwait.
(5) South Africa’s President Ramaphosa is re-elected for second term
The African National Congress (ANC) and its largest rival, the white-led, pro-business Democratic Alliance (DA), agreed on June 14 to work together in South Africa’s new government of national unity, a step change after 30 years of ANC rule. Once unthinkable, the accord allowed President Cyril Ramaphosa to win a second term in office. He was re-elected by lawmakers with 283 votes.
The deal between two sharply antagonistic parties is the most momentous political shift in South Africa since Nelson Mandela led the ANC to victory in the 1994 election that marked the end of apartheid. The ANC lost its majority for the first time in an election on May 29 and spent two weeks in talks with other parties that went down to the wire on Friday morning as the new parliament was convening in Cape Town.
The National Assembly had earlier elected a DA lawmaker as deputy speaker, after choosing an ANC politician as speaker - the first concrete instance of power sharing between the two parties.
Editorial | A new era: on the South Africa general election
Long seen as unbeatable in national elections, the ANC lost support in recent years as voters wearied of persistently high levels of poverty, inequality and crime, rolling power cuts and corruption in party ranks.
