Rajnath May Get Home, Jaitley Finance

<div>Till late on Monday (26 May) night there was no official word on the portfolios of the newly appointed Ministers of the Narendra Modi cabinet but the talk was that Rajnath Singh was being made the Home Minister while Arun Jaitley may be the Finance Minister with additional charge of Defence.<br /><br />Senior leader Sushma Swaraj is tipped to get External Affairs while Nitin Gadkari may be given charge of Surface Transport, Highways and Ports.<br /><br />Interestingly, Swaraj attended the dinner hosted by President Pranab Mukherjee to foreign leaders who had attended the swearing-in ceremony.<br /><br />Speculation was that another senior BJP leader M Venkaiah Naidu may be given Rural Development and Poverty Alleviation while Gopinath Munde may get Agriculture.<br /><br />Former Karnataka Chief Minister D V Sadananda Gowda is tipped to get Railways. Smriti Irani, who has been surprisingly inducted with a Cabinet rank, is talked about as the new HRD Minister.<br /><br />Ashok Gajapati Raju, who belongs to BJP's ally TDP, may get Civil Aviation portfolio. Akali Dal's Harsimrat Kaur Badal is being speculated to get Food Processing Industries Ministry while Shiv Sena's Anant Geete is tipped to get Heavy Industry Ministry.<br /><br />BJP's Ravi Shankar Prasad is likely to get Law and Telecom while his party colleague Prakash Javadekar could be the new Minister of State with Independent charge in Information and Broadcasting and Environment.<br /><br />(Agencies)</div>