The portfolios of many of the newly sworn-in Ministers of the 18th Lok Sabha signal no significant changes from what they held in the previous regime. The Bharatiya Janata Party continues to retain the ‘major’ portfolios, from Home to Telecommunications, with the rest distributed among its coalition allies. The 18th Lok Sabha also includes five Ministers of State with independent charge.
One of them is Jitendra Singh, whose portfolio spans the Departments of Space (DoS) and Atomic Energy (DAE), the Ministries of Earth Sciences (MoES) , Science and Technology (MST) , and Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions . Each of these ministries or departments by itself is a handful these days. The DoS is grappling with the entry of private sector players in the national space programme as well as managing the development of the maiden human spaceflight mission and new launch vehicles.
The MoES is involved in missions to explore the seabed for mineral resources — an enterprise just beginning to feature in multilateral fora — as well as climate adaptation and mitigation. The MST oversees India’s three foremost research departments at a time when the world is haring to test artificial intelligence, build quantum computers, develop and deploy multi-omics approaches in sectors from agriculture to medicine, and invent advanced energy storage solutions. The DAE has announced plans to rapidly advance nuclear power, which includes starting phase two of its reactors programme and co.