Singh failed to honor promises to bring about major changes in his second cabinet revamp this year, keeping his finance, interior, defense, foreign and trade ministers in an indication that long-stalled economic reforms were unlikely to be revived any time soon.
The minor changes were also seen as an attempt to remove some underperforming ministers as well as prepare the ruling Congress party for a key election in Uttar Pradesh next year, a state seen as setting the stage for a national election in 2014.
The changes may reaffirm the view that Singh and the Congress party-led alliance preferred to keep its allies in top positions to fight a slew of graft scandals, public protests and high inflation that have undermined the government.
“This is not really taking the bull by the horn, as they say. These are very very minor changes,” said D.H. Pai Panindikar, head of New Delhi-based think tank RPG Foundation.
Markets did not react to the news.
In a surprise move, the maverick and influential Jairam Ramesh was moved to the rural development ministry from environment, where as a minister he has been seen as holding up multi-billion-dollar investments into steel, infrastructure, mining and power sectors by strict enforcement of green laws.
Ramesh is believed to be close to Congress president Sonia Gandhi but has had differences with the prime minister.
The rural development ministry, which looks after an expensive job guarantee scheme popular with the poor, is central to the ruling party’s strategy to keep its rural voter base.
