Cabinet Reshuffle: Ashwini Vaishnaw gets sworn in as India's new IT minister

The cabinet reshuffle today gave us our new IT minister and a new minister for information and broadcasting.

President Ram Nath Kovind administers oath to Ashwini Vaishnaw as a Cabinet Minister, at a swearing-in ceremony at the Rashtrapati Bhavan, in New Delhi,  (PTI)

PM Narendra Modu rejigged his council of ministers today. This is the first cabinet reshuffle that has happened since he assumed charges for a second term. About 43 new ministers were sworn in today evening to the new cabinet following the resignation of 12 ministers. The President of India, as advised by the PM, accepted the resignation of the following members of the Council of Ministers, with immediate effect:-

1. D.V. Sadananda Gowda

2. Ravi Shankar Prasad

3. Thaawarchand Gehlot

4. Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank'

5. Dr. Harsh Vardhan

6. Prakash Javadekar

7. Santosh Kumar Gangwar

8. Babul Supriyo

9. Dhotre Sanjay Shamrao

10. Rattan Lal Kataria

11. Pratap Chandra Sarangi

12. Debasree Chaudhuri

Following Ravi Shankar Prasad's resignation, Ashwini Vaishnaw got sworn in as the new minister for Railways, Communication & Electronics and Information Technology. And Anurag Thakur was sworn in as the new minister for Information & Broadcasting and Sports.

The new IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw is a Rajya Sabha member from Odisha. He's a former IAS officer of the 1994 batch and has handled important responsibilities for over 15 years. He's particularly known for his contribution towards the PPP framework in infrastructure. He has also held leadership roles in companies like General Electric and Siemens. Vaishnaw has an MBA from Wharton School, Pennysylvania University, and an MTech from IIT Kanpur.