Rohini Singh takes stock of the political heavyweights in the Modi Cabinet. In strikingly different ways the ministers for finance, home & foreign affairs have worked out their private equation with the PM.Arguably the most important minister in Narendra Modi’s Cabinet, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley is Modi’s go-to man. People close to Jaitley say he was one of the “strongest backers” of Modi as the party’s PM candidate at a time several heavyweights were against the idea.Jaitley had also handled Modi’s legal issues as well as those of BJP President Amit Shah. A party leader says when Shah was banned from entering Gujarat by the Supreme Court, he went first to Jaitley’s house.As BJP president now, Shah relies heavily on Jaitley. “Those working closely with Shah now in the party are all Arun Jaitley’s people. Shah’s assessment of people is based on Arun’s assessment and Modi too goes along,” says a party leader.This leader pointed out how all those considered to be close to Jaitley, Piyush Goyal, Nirmala Sitharaman and Dharmendra Pradhan got appointed in key ministries. “All these names were endorsed by Shah as well. Jaitley and Shah tend to work in tandem,” says the leader.The same was true for appointment of law officers. “When the appointment of Jaitley’s good friend Mukul Rohatgi was stuck for some reason, Amit Shah spoke to Modi and got it processed,” says a friend of Jaitley.The close relationship between Modi, Jaitley and Shah is a source of much envy. Some party leaders say of the trio, Jaitley is the most vulnerable to attack. “Of the trio, Jaitley is the easiest to attack since Modi can’t be attacked and attacks on Shah will only start post Bihar if the party does badly,” says a BJP leader. And as a liberal, he is also not popular with the hardline elements in BJP.“But there’s no replacement for Jaitley,” says a senior leader in the party. “More than finance minister, he is Modi’s chief troubleshooter,” says this person.But if the performance of Modi Sarkar is to be judged largely on economy, then Modi’s most important minister is also the one who will be judged most ultimately, BJP leaders say. “He’s invaluable, but he’s also got to prove himself ultimately”, is how one leader put it. “Much of people’s impatience with Modi Sarkar’s performance also reflects on Jaitley”, this leader argued, saying this will be the big test.A Thakur leader from UP, Rajnath Singh is officially the number two in the Modi Cabinet. An official notification ensures he gets to chair Cabinet meetings when the PM is away. A Sangh favourite, Singh is a political heavyweight and Modi and Shah are careful not to ruffle his feathers. When Singh publically expressed displeasure at rumours being spread about his son, allegedly by a Cabinet colleague, Modi and Shah rushed to assuage him.After Rajnath’s strong response, those rumors stopped. “The message was clear – Rajnath was not going to stay quiet,” says a BJP functionary. In his first stint as BJP president, Singh shared an uneasy relationship with Modi and Jaitley.He dropped Modi from the party’s central parliamentary board, and Jaitley from the post of chief spokesman. But in his second stint, his relationship with Modi improved dramatically. Singh batted for Modi against LK Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi and Sushma Swaraj A senior Congress leader had also gone to Singh’s house when he was the president to dissuade him from declaring Modi as the party’s PM candidate. But Singh went ahead with the announcement in Goa. “He also got dissidents to stop critiquing Modi in public during the run-up to the election,” says a BJP leader. At one point Singh got Yashwant Sinha to speak to Shatrughan Sinha to tone down the latter’s remarks against Modi.The appointment of Nripendra Misra as the prime minister’s principal secretary is said to have happened after Singh recommended the former bureaucrat’s name. Singh, as UP chief minister, had worked with Misra.BJP leaders say when Shah used Yogi Adityanath as a star campaigner in UP during assembly bypolls last year, party circles thought another Thakur was being promoted. But bypoll results were dismal, and the Yogi factor is not a concern for Singh anymore. Indeed, Singh is now sought after as a leader who understands farmers’ issues.But as smooth as Singh-Modi relations may be now, the uneasy relationship between the finance and home ministers can still become a problem for the prime minister, party leaders say. “The downfall of UPA-2 started with the shadow war between Pranab Mukherjee and P Chidambaram. Round-2 of Singh vs Jaitley, if it happens, can get troublesome for the PM,” says a party veteran.Sushma-ji’s is a case of a remarkable transformation”, a BJP leader says. This political heavyweight, a Modi critic in the days before Modi ascended to the top of the party, has adjusted remarkably well to her role as a very low-profile foreign minister.“She’s still very good at her job, even if no one talks about it”, is how one party veteran put it. Modi runs foreign policy just as the way many PMs have done. In fact, offcials say, Modi is even more personally involved than most recent PMs. This could have been a source of angst for Swaraj, but she has simply got on with it.“She’s shown great dignity,” a BJP leader says. Officials say Modi always keeps Swaraj informed of his key ideas and initiatives. Officials also say Modi has asked Swaraj to keep special focus on the Middle East and Saarc. Like the PM, the foreign minister is also a frequent traveller. “But she’s not a publicity hound…you don’t hear about these trips,” one BJP leader observes.“Sushma Swaraj really knows the dos and don’ts of ministerial functioning,” is how one senior official put it. Many had expected Swaraj to be a prominently dissenting voice in the Modi Cabinet, a magnet for all murmurs against Modi. But that hasn’t happened.In a demonstration of how Indian politics can throw up surprises, Sushma Swaraj, who opposed Narendra Modi’s candidature as PM, is probably his most well-adjusted senior Cabinet minister