Inter-state council reconstituted

The Inter-State Council, a constitutional body to facilitate coordination between states and the centre, has been reconstituted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, an official statement said on Friday.

The reconstitution comes months after a cabinet reshuffle, and the new list excludes Smriti Irani, who was earlier there in capacity of Human Resources Development Minister and was shifted to Textile Ministry in the reshuffle that took place in July this year.

D.V. Sadananda Gowda, who was earlier the Law Minister, is also out.

Present HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar is meanwhile the new entrant in the list.

The council which has the prime minister as its chairman, has chief ministers of all states and union territories, six Union Ministers - Home Minister Rajnath Singh, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, Urban Development Minister M. Venkaiah Naidu, Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar and Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari - as its members.

Other ministers on the list include Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu, Consumer Affairs Minister Ramvilas Paswan, Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, Food Processing Minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal, Tribal Affairs Minister Jual Oram, Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Coal Minister Piyush Goyal, and Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan.

The standing committee of the Inter State Council was also reconstituted.

Chaired by the Home Minister, this committee has Sushma Swaraj, Jaitley, Naidu, and Gadkari, along with chief ministers of Andhra Pradesh, Punjab, Chattisgarh, Tripura, Odisha, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh.

The council and the committee have been formed to "create a strong institutional framework to promote and support cooperative federalism in the country", as per its website.

--IANS

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