Parrikar to be sworn in as Goa chief minister tomorrow

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi's cabinet in his historic third term will retain the known faces in the big four ministries - Amit Shah will retain the Home portfolio, Rajnath Singh Defence, Foreign ministry will be retained by S Jaishankar and the Finance ministry by Nirmala Sitharaman. 

The Prime Minister himself will handle the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, the Department of Atomic Energy and the Department of Space.

Many of the ministers have been retained with their last jobs in the interest of continuity as well. Among them is Nitin Gadkari, who will retain the Road Transport and Highways ministry with two juniors under him -- Ajay Tamta and Harsh Malhotra. The 67-year-old has been the longest serving minister in the department and has been credited with the building of construction of more than 54,858 km of national highways over the last 10 years.

Piyush Goyal has retained the Commerce portfolio.

JP Nadda, the health minister in PM Modi's first cabinet, has been brought back with the same portfolio. He has also been given additional charge of the Chemicals and Fertilisers department.

The plum portfolios of I&B and railways will be handled by Ashwini Vaishnaw. The Civil Aviation Ministry has changed hands from Jyotiraditya Scindia to TDP's Ram Mohan Naidu, the youngest minister in the cabinet. Mr Scindia has been put in charge of the Telecom ministry.

Two former Chief Ministers from the key BJP states of Haryana and Madhya Pradesh, who have been brought to the Centre, have been allocated significant responsibility. Manohar Lal Khattar will handle two key ministries -- Power and Housing and Urban Affairs. For the first, he would have the assistance of junior minister Shripad Naik, for the second, Tokhan Sahu, the first-time minister from Chhattisgarh.

Shivraj Singh Chouhan, the four-time Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, will handle the key ministry of Agriculture, and the related Farmers Welfare and Rural Development ministries.

Former Minister for Earth Sciences and Food Processing, Kiren Rijiju, has been put in charge of Parliamentary Affairs, previously handled by Pralhad Joshi. Mr Joshi has been moved to the Food, Consumer Affairs and Renewable Energy department.

CR Paatil will be in charge of Jal Shakti ministry and Bhupendra Yadav, Environment. Giriraj Singh has been shifted to Textiles -- a department handled by Smriti Irani. Annapurna Devi will be in charge of the other portfolio handled by Ms Irani -- Women & Child Development. Mansukh Mandavia has been put in charge of Labour and Employment and Sports and Youth Affairs.

Ravneet Singh Bittu -- the grandson of former Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh who was assassinated in 1995 -- will be the junior minster for food processing and railways. Mr Bittu has lost the election from Ludhiana and will have to get a seat in either house of parliament within the next six months.

Among allies, former Bihar Chief Minister and HAM chief Jitan Ram Manjhi will have charge of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises with Shobha Karandlaje as the Minister of State.

South ally and Janata Dal Secular chief HD Kumaraswamy has been put in charge of the Heavy Industries and Steel portfolios.

Key Bihar ally and LJP chief Chirag Paswan has been given charge of the Food Processing department.

Among the Ministers of State with Independent Charge, Dr Jitendra Singh is expected to be the busiest. A third-time Union minister from Jammu and Kashmir, he has been put in charge of multiple portfolios -- Science and Technology, Ministry of Earth Sciences, Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, Department of Atomic Energy, Department of Space and the Prime Minister's Office.

Arjun Ram Meghwal will have Independent charge of for Law and Justice and will also be the junior minister for Parliamentary Affairs.

The share market has posted a massive jump in the early trade, banking on the hopes of political stability as predicted by the exit polls. The 30-share Sensex rallied over 2,000 points this morning while the 50-stock Nifty recorded its biggest jump in four years during the market opening.

Both Sensex and Nifty, the indexes of the Bombay Stock Exchange and the National Stock Exchange, hit their record high levels today. All Sensex and Nifty stocks are now in the green.

At pre-open, Nifty surged over 800 points or 3.58% to 23,227.90 while the Sensex jumped 2,621.98 points or 3.55% to 76,583.29.

Adani Ports, Adani Enterprises, Power Grid, Shriram Finance, and NTPC are among the top performers that led the market rally with significant gains. The latest GDP data suggesting a robust 8.2% fiscal growth also bolstered the market sentiment. 

"Buoyant sentiments are driven by India's impressive Q4FY24 GDP growth of 7.8 per cent, surpassing expectations, with the fiscal year's growth standing at 8.2 per cent," said Varun Aggarwal, founder and managing director of Profit Idea. He also cautioned that the market will remain volatile in anticipation of the results pending tomorrow.

An aggregate of 12 exit polls on Saturday predicted the BJP will return to power with the ruling NDA alliance with 365 seats. A party or an alliance needs at least 272 seats to form government in the country. The market prefers political stability and a change in government usually risks volatility in the share market, according to analysts. 

The exit polls have also predicted that the BJP is set to break ground in Kerala and Tamil Nadu in the south, and make large gains in Odisha and Bengal in the east. There is, however, a health warning: exit polls do not always get it right. 

While the BJP has welcomed the exit poll predictions, the Opposition has dismissed the forecast and said the counting day will throw a completely different picture. Following a meeting of the Opposition leaders part of the INDIA bloc, Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge Saturday said that the bloc will win at least 295 seats out of the total 543.

Chandigarh: Newly-elected BJP MP Kangana Ranaut on Thursday was allegedly assaulted by a woman constable of the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) at the Mohali airport when she was on her way to Delhi, officials said.

The constable has been suspended and an FIR has been lodged against her, they said.

The CISF constable allegedly assaulted Kangana while frisking her at the airport before she boarded her flight.

The Bollywood actor was elected to Lok Sabha from Mandi Constituency in Himachal Pradesh where she defeated her nearest Congress rival by over 74,000 votes.

Speaking on the incident, Kangana said that she is "safe" and alleged that there is rise in "terror and violence" in Punjab.

In the video posted on X, Kangana said, "I am getting lot of calls from my wellwishers and media... I just want to say that I am safe."

"The incident took place while I was going through security check at Chandigarh airport. While leaving, there was a lady in other cabin who was security personnel of CISF. She waited for me to cross her, then came and hit me on the side of my face and started abusing me. When I asked her why is she doing this, she said that she supports farmers' protest," Kangana said in the video.

"I am safe but my only concern is that how do we handle the rising violence and terrorism in Punjab," she asked. 

Detained

CISF constable Kulwinder Kaur posted at Chandigarh airport was immediately detained and held in the commandant office at the airport while the police started recording her statements to file an FIR.

Kulwinder Kaur was reportedly angry with actor Kangana for her derogatory remarks made on the farmers protest.

In 2021, an FIR was filed against Kangana after she referred to farmers' protests (Kisan Morcha) as a Khalistani movement and the Sikh community as Khalistani terrorists.

"Khalistani terrorists may be arm twisting the government today... But let's not forget one woman... The only woman prime minister ne inn ko apni jooti ke neeche crush kiya tha (the only woman PM who crushed them under her shoes). No matter how much suffering she caused to this nation... she crushed them like mosquitoes at the cost of her own life... Lekin desh k tukde nahi hone diye (but she did not let the nation get divided)," Kangana posed on her Instagram story.