Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik’s biggest-ever Ministry reshuffle points more to a political streamlining rather than any sort of a governance streamlining exercise as consistently maintained by Patnaik prior to the rejig.
While the CM has very tactfully eased out some controversial and some nonperforming Ministers either from electoral or administrative point of view, the streamlining of failing governance level in his fourth term nowhere looks discernible when one goes by the distribution of portfolios to the Ministers.
For instance, when the recent Swachh Sarvekshan-2017 revealed acute gaps in civic governance across the municipal towns in the State, the clubbing of two major Ministries, Industries and Urban Development, defies the logic of pro-people administration, which the CM has described as the rationale behind the big reshuffle. For Niranjan Pujari, the new Industries Minister, the task of juggling with both these departments would be quite onerous because for rapid industrialisation and urbanisation a progressive State does need fulltime Ministers.
However, the Chief Minister did make some streamlining of departments when he gave Shasibhushan Behera the charge of both Finance and Excise Departments and brought the Cooperation Department under Surjya Nararayan Patro, who is the new Minister of Food and Civil Supplies. It needs mentioning that lack of coordination between the Food and Civil supplies, Cooperation and the Agriculture Departments has embarrassed the Government often when farmers went for distress sale of their products many a times during the last three years due to lack of adequate storage facilities.
But such administration streamlining is not the unique discernible theme in the entire Ministry rejig as entrusting of additional charge of Mines and Steel to the new Energy Minister Prafulla Mallick defies any sensible logic, when the Energy Department is already beset with complex problems for which the State is gradually slipping into power-deficit coupled with poor power infrastructure, and for which the department needs service of a fulltime Minister.
Moreover, entrusting of the significant Agriculture Department to senior leader Damodar Rout would hardly bring any reassurance to the toiling farmers or their organisations when Rout’s view on farmers’ suicide or any other problem afflicting the State’s farming sector are well-known in public domain.
Similarly, giving additional charge of law Department to new Health Minister Pratap Jena does not look to be a sensible administrative decision when the health sector in Odisha is virtually in limbo. Besides, not appointing a fulltime MSME Minister also underlines the poor streamlining exercise of governance in the much-acclaimed reshuffle when MSME is the largest job-provider department in the State.
With regard to the political message, the Ministry rejig not only shows the CM is trying to halt the anti-incumbency trend gripping hard on his Government by sacrificing the controversial and liable Ministers but also is aimed at keeping an intraparty balance in feud-hit districts like Sambalpur, Mayurbhanj, Balangir, Kendrapada, Kalahandi and Angul by not appointing any in his Ministry from the districts.