Modi 2.0 Cabinet: Piyush Goyal, the policy hawk who walks the talk

Under Goyal, Railway Ministry increased the pace of infrastructure projects including track renewal and electrification. He was the architect of the communications blitzkrieg that made Modi PM in 2014

Piyush Goyal ended the Modi government’s first term as the railway and coal minister and had been interim finance minister twice, from May 2018 to August 2018, and from mid-January to mid-February 2019, in Arun Jaitley’s absence. Goyal presented the interim budget 2019-20. During his first short stint, project Shashakt was also launched, enabling banks to deal with non-performing assets before they were taken to the insolvency and bankruptcy process. Under Goyal, the Railway Ministry had increased the pace of infrastructure projects including track renewal and electrification. 

A member of the BJP, he has been representing Maharashtra in the Rajya Sabha since 2010.

Piyush Goyal's tenure as the power minister saw the rollout of the Ujwal DISCOM Assurance Yojana (UDAY) and fast-tracking of electrification of nearly 18,000 unelectrified villages under the Pradhan Mantri Sahaj Bijli Har Ghar Yojana (Saubhagya). He also oversaw the government's LED bulb distribution programme known as UJALA. He was temporarily given additional charge of the Ministry of Finance from May through August 2018 as Jaitley was undergoing a medical treatment. He again took charge as the finance and corporate affairs minister on January 23, 2019 and shouldered that responsibility until February 15, 2019. During this time, he presented the Interim Budget 2019, in which the government rolled out the PM-KISAN scheme, a direct cash income support scheme for small and marginal farmers; and an income-tax rebate for middle-class taxpayers. The two measures, along with other select announcements, have been viewed as the government's bid to woo voters, especially distressed farmers, ahead of the 2019 elections. Piyush Goyal is also a member of the committee tasked with preparing BJP's manifesto for the Lok Sabha polls.

During his 34 year long political career,  Goyal has held several important positions in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and is in its National Executive. He has been the National Treasurer of the Party. He also headed the BJP’s Information Communication Campaign Committee and oversaw the publicity and advertising campaign of the party including the social media outreach for the Indian General Elections 2014.

His father, Late Vedprakash Goyal was Union Minister of Shipping, and the National Treasurer of the BJP for over two decades. His mother Chandrakanta Goyal was elected thrice to the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly from Mumbai. He is married to Seema, an active social worker and has two children – Dhruv, who is working in New York, and Radhika, who is studying at Harvard University, USA.