Rate India\'s Outgoing Power Minister

By HEATHER TIMMONS and SRUTHI GOTTIPATI

Barkha Dutt, NDTV anchor: So you're satisfied with your stint in the power ministry? How would you rate yourself? Would you rate yourself average, good, very good or excellent?

Sushil Kumar Shinde, the outgoing power minister:  Excellent!

Mr. Shinde, who just has been promoted to minister of home affairs, India's top security position, raised some eyebrows when he declared himself an “excellent” power minister in an interview with NDTV on Wednesday. After all, Mr. Shinde has just presided over the world's biggest blackout. Two of them, in fact: on Monday and Tuesday, when massive grid failures left hundreds of millions in India without power.

Mr. Shinde's move to the ministry of home affairs, which was announced Tuesday as part of a reshuffle of the cabinet, was roundly criticized as ill-timed and tone deaf. The move is an obvious sign of the r uling Congress Party's “preference to seniority and not to merit,” the Hindustan Times wrote.

Responses to Mr. Shinde's interview, and his own personal rating, were swift and acerbic: “Is Sushil Kumar Shinde a staff writer at The Onion ?” Sachin Kalbag, executive editor of the newspaper Mid Day, asked on Twitter, referring to the satirical newspaper.

Mr. Shinde asked that viewers appreciate that the power was turned back on in India in a matter of hours. “In 2003, the same situation arose in North America, and at that time for four days continuously, America was not having power,” he said. (In 2003, part of eight states were blacked out after a power surge, but many areas had power after 24 hours.) “India has handled the situation well,” Mr. Shinde said.

Despite some reports to the contrary, Mr. Shinde laid the blame for the outages fully on states that were withdrawing more power than they should have. “The grid failed because of the over loading of the power,” he said, contending that “many states” try to take more power than scheduled.

His assertion seemed to be contradicted by the incoming power minister, M. Veerappa Moily. “We don't want to be in the blame game,” Mr. Moily said during a press conference Wednesday afternoon.

“According to assessment the world over, India has the best and largest power grid system,” Mr. Moily said. The “question is, ‘What has happened?'”

How would you rate Mr. Shinde's performance as power minister? Please let us know in the comments below.