The south is grossly underrepresented and if the BJP was to strengthen its presence in the region, it cannot be done through disincentives.

On Sunday, when Prime minister Narendra Modi inducted 21 new members to his council of ministers, the strength of his cabinet rose to 66. But what has gone under the radar is south India.

Compared to 27 ministers from the south in the UPA II cabinet, all that the Modi ministry has, that too after the expansion, is only eight people - four cabinet ministers and an equal number of ministers of state. Of this, five - Venkaiah Naidu, Nirmala Sitaraman, Bendaru Dattatreya, YS Chowdary and Ashok Gajapati Raju - are from Andhra Pradesh/Telangana; another three - Ananthkumar, DV Sadananda Gowda and GM Siddeshwara - are from Karnataka and just one is from Tamil Nadu - Pon Radhakrishnan. Kerala has none.

In Manmohan Singh’s council, the number of cabinet ministers from the southern states alone was 12. Out of the 27 ministers, Andhra Pradesh accounted for 11, nearly twice the total number of southern ministers in Modi’s cabinet, followed by eight from the tiny state of Kerala.

The BJP can easily justify the weak presence of the south as representative of the strength of its MPs from each state. How can one appoint ministers when it doesn’t have enough MPs to choose from? But what gets buried in the process is a choice that is wrong for two reasons.

One, the south is grossly underrepresented and two, if the BJP was to strengthen its presence in the south, it cannot be done through disincentives.

The southern states represent 20 percent of India’s geographical area and a fifth of its population. The south as a whole has been ahead of other states on both the socio economic and human development fronts. The states have achieved most of their development targets (including some of the MDGs) and have been surging in terms of FDI and industries such as IT and automobiles. The south is also known for some of the best PSUs in the country.

Does the new ministry reflect the relevance of the south and the aspirations of its people? Regretfully, no.

This underrepresentation of the south appears to be a disincentive for not voting for the BJP and its allies. The party is stronger in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, compared to Tamil Nadu and Kerala and hence has rewarded the former two with the maximum number of ministers.

While the BJP has tasted power in Karnataka and has made steady progress in Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala are still its last big hurdles in the south. In the recent elections, with timely and strategic alliance with local partners, the party has been able to make some headway in Tamil Nadu, but in Kerala it’s still a long way from winning a single seat.

The party reportedly has big plans for both Tamil Nadu and Kerala. In Tamil Nadu, it is trying to expand the non-Dravidian space and might be even able to achieve moderate success in the near future with what looks like the irreversible debacle of the Congress.

In Kerala, the party hopes to revive the grassroots and leverage the very strong presence of the RSS. Party president Amit Shah’s plan for the state is to build it from the bottom. The first step towards this strategy is a membership drive. That the party has polled 11 percent of the votes in Kerala in the last elections and won two seats (one by its ally PMK) in Tamil Nadu are quite encouraging for Shah and the state leaderships.

However, underrepresentation of the region in the cabinet is a wrong follow up strategy.

There were strong expectations that veteran leader and a former union minister O Rajagopal, who almost defeated Shashi Tharoor in Thiruvananthapuram, would get a berth at least in the second round, but he has been overlooked. Similarly, Tamil Nadu too was hopeful of at least a couple of more ministers.

If the BJP wants to make some progress in the south, it has to go beyond is present logic of representation and incentives. Notwithstanding their political preferences, the states, which are critical for the country’s socio-economic growth certainly deserve stronger presence in the cabinet.