Don’t want Cabinet berth due to health, ex-FM writes to PM
Prime Minister-designate Narendra Modi called on senior party leader Arun Jaitley at his residence late on Wednesday evening and asked him to reconsider his earlier decision to opt out of the Cabinet on health ground.
On the eve of the swearing-in ceremony of the new BJP Government, Jaitley wrote to the Modi saying he would not like to take ministerial responsibilities in his new Government on account of his health conditions.
Jaitley posted on Twitter the letter he wrote to Modi requesting recusal from being a part of the new NDA Government.
Jaitley said soon after BJP won a massive majority in the just-concluded Lok Sabha elections, he informed Modi orally about his intentions of taking time out for treatment of an undisclosed illness.
Without disclosing the ailment he is being treated for, Jaitley said he would continue to informally support the Government and the party in any form that is required.
“I am writing to you to formally request you that I should be allowed a reasonable time for myself, my treatment and my health and therefore, not be a part of any responsibility, for the present, in the new Government,” Jaitley wrote.
Jaitley, 66, was admitted to AIIMS last week to undergo tests and treatment for an undisclosed illness and was discharged on Thursday - the day results of Lok Sabha elections were announced.
He, however, did not attend celebrations at BJP headquarters that evening after the party’s emphatic victory. BJP won a landslide 303 seats, of the 542, in the general elections.
In the letter, Jaitley said during the last 18 months, he has had “some serious” health challenges.
“My doctors have enabled me to emerge out of most of them. After the campaign had concluded and you were leaving for Kedarnath, I had orally informed you that even though I was able to discharge the responsibilities assigned to me during the campaign, I would in future, for sometime, like to keep away from any responsibility. This will enable me to concentrate on my treatment and health,” he wrote.
Stating it was a matter of “great honour and learning experience” to have been a part of the Modi Government for the last five years, Jaitley said even earlier the party had bestowed responsibility on him in the first NDA Government, as also when the BJP was in the Opposition.
Jaitley was the Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha from 2009 to 2014.
“I could not have asked for more,” Jaitley said.
A key party strategist, he has been the party’s spokesperson for many years. He entered Parliament at the age of 47 when he was nominated to the Rajya Sabha from Gujarat, where Modi was the Chief Minister.
Jaitley was a Minister in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Government and when Modi swept to power in 2014, he was made the Finance Minister and also handled briefly the additional charge of Defence and Information and Broadcasting Ministries.