Over 10% ministers in Modi's new council women

NEW DELHI: Women ministers constitute over 10 per cent of the Union council of ministers sworn in on Thursday. Of the six ladies administered the ministerial oath, three are Cabinet ministers and three, ministers of state.
In the outgoing council of ministers, there were six women ministers assigned Cabinet rank and two MoS.
The three women ministers conferred Cabinet rank on Thursday — Nirmala Sitharaman, Harsimrat Kaur Badal and Smriti Zubin Irani — had enjoyed the same status in the erstwhile Modi Cabinet. While Sitharaman, a Rajya Sabha MP, was defence minister in the last government, Harsimrat, re-elected from Bathinda, was the food processing minister.
Irani was hailed by many as a ‘giant-slayer’ after she defeated Congress president and three-time MP Rahul Gandhi in his family bastion of Amethi on May 23. She was inducted in erstwhile Modi Cabinet first as HRD minister, but then shifted to I&B ministry and finally, textiles ministry.
Among three women ministers of state, Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti has been inducted into the council of ministers for the second time. She had served as minister of state for food processing in the last term. The other two women assigned MoS rank — Renuka Singh Saruta and Debasree Chaudhuri — are both Chaudhuri is a first-time MP from Raiganj constituency in West Bengal. Chaudhuri had defeated her Trinamool Congress rival by over 60,000 votes.
The three women ministers from the outgoing Cabinet left out this time include Sushma Swaraj who was in charge of external affairs portfolio in the last government; eight-time MP and erstwhile women and child minister Maneka Gandhi; and Uma Bharati who looked after drinking water and sanitation. An MoS not re-inducted either is Anupriya Patel, who was serving in the ministry of health and family welfare.