The reality of Cabinet panels

The government’s decision to create six Cabinet committees — on security, economic affairs, political affairs, parliamentary affairs, appointments and accommodation — suggests that Prime Minister Narendra Modi heads a BJP government for all practical purposes.

The BJP’s allies have all been brought into the Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs which has thus become a NDA coordination committee in reality, and therefore redundant as a committee of the Cabinet. It might as well be scrapped. After all, top party-level talks between the BJP and its allies will be held with the highest leaders of these parties who are not in government (except Ram Vilas Paswan).

In the days of PM Indira Gandhi, the powerful CCPA was the place where key decisions were taken. Its members were those ministers who are now members of the Cabinet Committee on Security — besides the PM. The CCPA was, effectively, the national security council.

The proliferation of Cabinet committees came with the coalition era as lip service had to be paid to ministers from various parties. Most glaringly in the present instance, food minister Ram Vilas Paswan has been kept out of the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs when bringing down food prices is a key objective. As such the CCEA won’t be a place for real discussions. To nominally please allies, the civil aviation minister and the food processing minister are in the CCEA when they need not be. A Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Affairs also seems redundant.