In line with its “minimum Government, maximum governance” policy, the NDA Government has decided to merge the Overseas Indian Affairs Ministry (MOIA) with the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) to prevent duplication of work and unnecessary delays.
External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj broke the news on Twitter on Thursday saying that since a majority of the work of the OIA is done by the MEA, it was felt that merging the two Ministries would be more appropriate. Swaraj and her deputy Gen(Rtd) VK Singh are, at present, heading both the Ministries which for the last ten years was headed by different Ministers.
“As Minister for External Affairs & Overseas Indian Affairs, I realised that substantial work of MOIA is done through our missions abroad. Therefore, I proposed to Prime Minister that MOIA should be merged with the Ministry of External Affairs. The Prime Minister has kindly accepted my proposal. So, the MOIA will now be part of the MEA,” Swaraj tweeted.
MEA spokesperson Vikas Swarup said the merger has been done after it was realised that for better synergy between India’s foreign policy objectives and diaspora outreach, the division between the Ministries was entirely unnatural and was resulting in duplication of work and unnecessary delays as entire execution of decision and policies taken by the MOIA was actually handled by Indian missions and posts which come under the MEA. Even for Parliament Questions and debates, the MOIA has to rely on data from Indian missions, hence, it was felt that merging the two would make things easy.