FDI hike in insurance to 49%

The Union Cabinet approved the proposal to raise the foreign direct investment, FDI, in insurance sector to 49 per cent, from the current level of 26 per cent. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, in his budget speech, earlier this month had proposed to raise the cap. The proposal to raise FDI cap has been pending since 2008 when the previous UPA government came up with Insurance Laws (Amendment) Bill to hike foreign holding in insurance joint ventures to 49 per cent. The BJP had earlier opposed it, saying it may not have the desired effect and could expose the economy to global vulnerability. The insurance sector was opened to private players in 2000 after the enactment of the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) Act, 1999.

Latest Chief Ministers & Governors Indian states

Chief Ministers & Governors of Indian States

S. NO	State and U.T.	Chief Minister	Governor
1	Andaman & Nicobar	U.T.	A. K. Singh (Lieutenant-Governor)
2	Andhra Pradesh	N.Chandrababu Naidu	Shri. E. S. L. Narasimhan
3	Arunachal Pradesh	Nabam Tuki	Nirbhay Sharma
4	Assam	Shri Tarun Gogoi	Janaki Ballabh Patnaik
5	Bihar	Jitan Ram Manjhi	DY Patil
6	Chandigarh	U.T.	Shri Shivraj V. Patil (Administrator)
7	Chhattisgarh	Dr. Raman Singh	Shri Balramji Dass Tandon
8	Goa	Shri Manohar Parrikar	Margaret Alva
9	Gujarat	Anandiben Patel	Shri Om Prakash Kohli
10	Haryana	Shri Bhupinder Singh Hooda	Shri Jagannath Pahadia
11	Himachal Pradesh	Virbhadra Singh	Urmila Singh
12	Jammu and Kashmir	Omar Abdullah	Narinder Nath Vohra
13	Jharkhand	Hemant Soren	Dr. Syed Ahmed
14	Karnataka	Shri K. Siddaramaiah	Konijeti Rosaiah
15	Kerala	Shri Oommen Chandy	Sheila Dikshit
16	Madhya Pradesh	Shri Shivraj Singh Chouhan	Ram Naresh Yadav
17	Maharashtra	Shri Prithviraj Chavan	K. Sankaranarayanan
18	Manipur	Shri Okram Ibobi Singh	Vinod Kumar Duggal
19	Meghalaya	Mukul Sangma	K. K. Paul
20	Mizoram	Pu Lalthanhawla	Dr. Kamla Beniwal
21	Nagaland	T R Zeliang	Shri Padmanabha Balakrishna Acharya
22	New Delhi	Arvind Kejriwal (resigned)	Najeeb Jung (Lieutenant-Governor)
23	Odisha	Sh. Naveen Patnaik	Shri S. C. Jamir
24	Puducherry	Shri N. Rangasamy	Ajay Kumar Singh (Retd. Lt. General)
25	Punjab	Shri Parkash Singh Badal	Shri Shivraj Patil
26	Rajasthan	Vasundhara Raje	Margaret Alva
27	Sikkim	Shri Pawan Kumar Chamling	Shriniwas Dadasaheb Patil
28	Tamil Nadu	Sushree J. Jayalalithaa	Konijeti Rosaiah
29	Telangana	K Chandrasekhar Rao	ESL Narasimhan
30	Tripura	Shri Manik Sarkar	Shri Vakkom Purushothaman (Additonal charge)
31	Uttar Pradesh	Akhilesh Yadav	Shri Ram Naik
32	Uttarakhand	Harish Rawat	Aziz Qureshi
33	West Bengal	Km. Mamata Banerjee	Shri Keshari Nath Tripathi
34	Dadra and Nagar Haveli	U.T.	Shri B.S. Bhalla (Administrator)
35	Daman and Diu	U.T.	Shri B.S. Bhalla (Administrator)
36	Lakshadweep	U.T.	Shri H. Rajesh Prasad

Cabinet Ministers and Portfolios 2014

Cabinet Ministers

Narendra Modi – Prime Minister, Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, Department of Atomic Energy Department of Space, All important policy issues and all other portfolios not allocated to any Minister

Rajnath Singh – Home Affairs

Sushma Swaraj – External Affairs, Overseas Indian Affairs

Arun Jaitley – Finance, Corporate Affairs, Defence

M Venkaiah Naidu – Urban Development, Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation, Parliamentary Affairs

Nitin Gadkari – Road Transport and Highways, Shipping

D V Sadananda Gowda – Railways

Uma Bharti – Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation

Najma Heptullah – Minority Affairs

Gopinath Munde – Rural Development, Panchayati Raj, Drinking Water and Sanitation

Ramvilas Paswan – Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution

Kalraj Mishra – Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises

Maneka Gandhi – Women and Child Development

Ananth Kumar – Chemicals and Fertilizers

Ravi Shankar Prasad – Communications and Information Technology, Law and Justice

Ashok Gajapathi Raju Pusapati – Civil Aviation

Anant Geete – Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises

Harsimrat Kaur Badal – Food Processing Industries

Narendra Singh Tomar – Mines, Steel, Labour and Employment

Jual Oram – Tribal Affairs

Radha Mohan Singh – Agriculture

Thaawar Chand Gehlot – Social Justice and Empowerment

Smriti Zubin Irani – Human Resource Development

Dr Harsh Vardhan - Health and Family Welfare

Ministers of State

General (Retd) V K Singh – Development of North Eastern Region (Independent Charge), External Affairs, Overseas Indian Affairs

Inderjit Singh Rao – Planning (Independent Charge), Statistics and Programme Implementation (Independent Charge), Defence

Santosh Kumar Gangwar – Textiles (Independent Charge), Parliamentary Affairs, Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation

Shripad Yesso Naik – Culture (Independent Charge), Tourism (Independent Charge)

Dharmendra Pradhan – Petroleum and Natural Gas (Independent Charge)

Sarbananda Sonowal – Skill Development, Entrepreneurship, Youth Affairs and Sports (Independent Charge)

Prakash Javadekar – Information and Broadcasting (Independent Charge), Environment, Forest and Climate Change (Independent Charge), Parliamentary Affairs

Piyush Goyal – Power (Independent  Charge), Coal (Independent Charge), New and Renewable Energy (Independent Charge)

Jitendra Singh – Science and Technology (Independent Charge), Earth Sciences (Independent Charge), Prime Minister Office, Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions, Department of Atomic Energy, Department of Space

Nirmala Sitharaman – Commerce and Industry (Independent Charge), Finance, Corporate Affairs

G M Siddeshwara – Civil Aviation

Manoj Sinha – Railways

Nihalchand – Chemicals and Fertilizers

Upendra Kushwaha – Rural Development, Panchayati Raj, Drinking Water and Sanitation

Radhakrishnan P – Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises

Kiren Rijiju – Home Affairs

Krishan Pal – Road Transport and Highways, Shipping

Dr Sanjeev Kumar Balyan – Agriculture, Food Processing Industries

Mansukhbhai Dhanjibhai Vasava – Tribal Affairs

Raosaheb Dadarao Danve – Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution

Vishnu Deo Sai – Mines, Steel, Labour and Employment

Sudarshan Bhagat – Social Justice and Empowerment