Power Minister Shinde appointed as India’s Home Minister

This week, Indian Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh needed to replace the Finance Minister since Pranab Mukherjee was elected to the ceremonial post of President.  He chose to bring back Harvard MBA, P Chidambaram to run Finance. Chidambaram has run this ministry before and was also one of the key architects of the momentous liberalization of July 1991 (along with Singh, and Montek Ahluwalia).

But just as important is the new man who is going to run the Home Ministry, the post that Chidambaram vacated.  That person is Sushil Kumar Shinde, who visited Los Angeles in April in his prior role as Union Minister of Power. Here is a photo of Minister Shinde and me with my colleague Smita. The Home Minister is often viewed as the second most powerful person in India.  Home, Defense, Foreign Affairs and Finance are the top cabinet position, according to most observers.

Gunjan Bagla, SK Shinde, Smita G.

Stay tuned for more about India’s Home Ministry. For more about the April event, read my last post about it, here.