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Fans of Sherlock Holmes will remember the question the great detective once asked: Why did the dog not bark? A slight variation of that question in Naya Bharat at the start of the monsoon session of parliament would be: Why has the much talked about Union cabinet reshuffle not taken place?

There is also a related question: Why has the new president of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) not been able to put in place a new team of his own? For months, political journalists and professional gossip-mongers have been encouraged (in off-the-record conversations) to talk about an ‘impending’ reshuffle.

There has been much speculation about who would be in and who could possibly be asked to go to the ‘organisation.’ There was even the suggestion of some kind of a Kamaraj Plan. Various deadlines were also announced for a grand mid-term reorganisation of ‘Team Modi’.

Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty.

Since no questions are allowed to be asked, everybody remains in the dark about the delay. It cannot be anybody’s case that Narendra Modi has to negotiate a reshuffle through some kind of a panchayat. He is not a ‘weak’ prime minister like his predecessor, who was often constrained by the Congress leadership and its preferences. Nor are there cabinet ministers – with the possible exception of home minister Amit Shah – who are immovable or indispensable. Very much like an American president, Modi is the lord and master of his cabinet and everybody serves at his pleasure.

The grand assumption – call it a national conceit – is that under the constitution we have a ‘cabinet system of government’ with collective responsibility and, therefore, collective functioning. Technically, that may be so – but that’s........

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