Finance minister Arun Jaitley is unlikely to continue in his current role due to poor health as Prime Minister Narendra Modi is set to begin his second term, according to four sources with knowledge of the matter.
Amit Shah, Narendra Modi's right hand man, could be a candidate to take up the finance ministry, according to a senior minister in the current government, who did not want to be named due to the sensitivity of the issue.
The sources said that Arun Jaitley, 66, is unlikely to take up any offer to continue in the top job steering Asia's third-largest economy as his health has deteriorated over the past few months.
"He is definitely not taking the post of the finance minister simply because he is very unwell," one of the sources, who did not want to be named, told Reuters.
"If at all, he might take up a less stressful role."
Piyush Goyal, 54, current railways and coal minister, also could be considered given that he stepped into the role twice in the Modi government between 2014 and 2019 when Jaitley was out sick.
Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) swept the Lok Sabha election 2019 with a historic mandate of about 300 out of 542 parliamentary seats that were contested, results announced by the Election Commission of India (ECI) on May 23 showed.
Arun Jaitley did not return messages. His mobile phone didn't ring.
His officer on special duty, Paras Sankhla, did not respond to calls, mail and messages. Arun Jaitley's personal secretary SD Ranakoti and assistant secretary Padam Singh Jamwal did not immediately respond to an email.
Arun Jaitley, who is one of the top three leaders in the BJP and the government, after Narendra Modi and party president Amit Shah, was not seen at the celebrations at BJP headquarters on Thursday night. Both Narendra Modi and Amit Shah gave victory speeches at the event.
Arun Jaitley has not been seen in public for at least two weeks but has been publishing blogs and messages on social media.
CHIEF TROUBLESHOOTER
In his latest message on social media, Arun Jaitley congratulated Prime Minister Modi and all the workers of the BJP and its allies on the victory.
"Aspirational India does not accept royalties, dynasties and caste-based parties," Arun Jaitley said in an apparent swipe at the opposition Congress party led by
Rahul Gandhi, the fourth scion of the Gandhi family.
Arun Jaitley, a lawyer-turned politician, is one of the most important leaders in the current cabinet. Arun Jaitley often acts as chief troubleshooter.
In the past five years, Arun Jaitley has steered through the Parliament major economic legislation such as a nationwide goods and services tax (GST) - which had languished for nearly two decades - and has defended controversial policies for the government.
Modi had given Arun Jaitley the responsibility of three ministries when he first took office in 2014, finance, defense and information and broadcasting ministries.
A diabetic, Arun Jaitley's health issues became worse after he had a kidney transplant in May last year. Arun Jaitley also had to skip the interim budget in February when he was in hospital in the United States getting cancer treatment.
The country's economy is showing major signs of a slowdown after three consecutive years of 7 per cent plus growth rates and the next finance minister is expected to seek to provide some economic stimulus without blowing the lid off the nation's fiscal deficit.