PM’s Trusted Lieutenant Retains Petroleum, Bags Steel Portfolio As Well

New Delhi: Senior BJP leader from Odisha and Union minister Dharmendra Pradhan has once again bagged the high-profile Petroleum Ministry in Narendra Modi 2.0 government. He has also been given the Steel portfolio.

By retaining the lucrative portfolio, Dharmendra has proved that he continues to enjoy the top party leadership’s unwavering support and goodwill.

Dharmendra was considered one of the most successful Union ministers in the previous Modi dispensation. The success of the Pradhan Mantri Ujjawla Yojana, which yielded rich dividends for the BJP in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls in 2017, helped him gain the trust of party leaders. He was seen as a hard taskmaster.

Even as his commitment as a Union minister made him stick to Delhi, his focus never left his home state. He kept visiting Odisha every alternate day in the past five years with a single objective — to consolidating BJP’s base and unseat the ruling BJD government.

He led from the front and micromanaged every aspect of the party’s electoral success in the state. Though party president and incoming Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s dream of capturing 120 Assembly seats in Odisha remained a distant dream, the lotus did bloom in 8 Lok Sabha seats.

Winning seven more seats than it had the last time in Odisha was by no means a mean achievement for the BJP, especially when the ruling BJD government has been voted to power for the fifth consecutive term in office.

Odisha’s success helped the BJP cross the magic mark of 300 in the elections. The achievement has not gone unnoticed. Dharmendra has thus been given the steel ministry along with the petroleum portfolio.

The Steel sector is witnessing a sluggish growth and the immediate task before him is to revive the sector. The other challenge is to keep rising oil prices in check amid a standoff between USA and oil-rich Iran, which is India’s major oil supplier.

Dharmendra’s rise to power has been quite remarkable. He was an active student’s union leader and a member of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) in his heydays. He burst into the national scene in 2012 when he was elected to the Rajya Sabha from Bihar. And when Narendra Modi came to power in 2014, he was given the Petroleum Ministry.