New Delhi, Sept 08: Feisty and temperamental Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee today made a re-entry into the Union Cabinet as a minister without portfolio after a gap of two and a half years along with MDMK representative Ginjee N Ramachandran, who quit the government in may following arrest of his personal assistant in a cash-for-transfer scam. Describing it as the "last expansion", Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee reshuffled portfolios of some of the Ministers of State, upgrading in the process Bandaru Dattatreya giving him independent charge of Urban Development and Poverty Alleviation.

PMO sources said 48-year old Banerjee, who was offered coal portfolio when she met Vajpayee last night, declined and preferred to remain minister without portfolio.

Vajpayee also did not bring back 59 year old Ramachandran into Finance Ministry which he had to quit but gave him Textiles Ministry. He had served in textiles when he had joined the government in 1999. His party MDMK had insisted that he should be re-inducted into the government. With today's expansion the strength of the Union Council of Ministers goes upto 81. Of them 31 are of Cabinet rank, eight hold independent charge in the rank of MoS and the rest 42 are Ministers of State.

In the reshuffle of the Ministers of State, Dattatreya's place in the Railway Ministry has been now taken by Basavagouda R Patil, who moves from textiles.

Yaso Naik, who was MoS in the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, now gets Finance, while P Radhakrishnan moves from Urban Development and Poverty Alleviation to Road Transport and Highways.

Santosh Gangwar, who was MoS in Labour Ministry, now shifts to Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises, continuing to hold additional charge of Parliamentary Affairs. The new ministers were administered the oath of office and secrecy by President A P J Abdul Kalam at a simple ceremony at Rashtrapati Bhavn.

Bureau Report