Narendra Modi's wealth up 42% in 2 yrs, Narendra Singh Tomar's 67%; Prakash Javadekar sees 50% fall

Narendra Singh Tomar, Union Minister of Rural Development, Panchayati Raj and Mines, witnessed the maximum rise in his wealth during 2015-17, while Prakash Javadekar, Minister of Human Resource Development, saw the steepest decline during the period, according to data sourced from the Prime Minister’s Office website. Tomar’s wealth during the period rose 67.5 percent (from Rs 53 lakh in 2014-15 to Rs 89 lakh in 2016-17) while Javadekar’s declined 50 percent (from Rs 1.11 crore to Rs 56 lakh), the data shows. Prime Minister Narendra Modi comes in at third spot with a 41.8 percent rise in net assets (from Rs 1.41 crore to Rs 2 crore) after Minister of Statistics and Programme Implementation Sadanand Gowda whose wealth increased 42.3 percent (from Rs 4.65 crore to Rs 6.62 crore). [caption id=“attachment_3384238” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  File image of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. PTI[/caption] Meanwhile, steel minister Chaudhary Birender Singh saw a rise in wealth of 23.5 percent (from Rs 7.97 crore to Rs 9.85 crore), external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj 17.4 percent (from Rs 4.55 crore to Rs 5.34 crore), MoS external affairs VK Singh 12.5 percent (from Rs 69 lakh to Rs 78 lakh), aviation minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju 11.7 percent (from Rs 6.98 crore to Rs 7.80 crore) and minority affairs minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi 7.8 percent (from Rs 99 lakh to Rs 1.07 crore). Apart from Javadekar, others who saw a fall in wealth are Ram Vilas Paswan (30.8 percent), JP Nadda (14.6 percent) and Arun Jaitley (4.3 percent) Interestingly, an analysis of the combined wealth of the ministers and their spouses paint a completely different picture such as in the case of Javadekar and Paswan. Prachi Javadekar’s saw 190 percent increase in wealth over the two-year period. The Javadekar’s jointly saw their wealth increase 107 percent, the highest among the lot, to Rs 6.69 crore. Similar is the case with Paswan, whose wealth including that of Reena Paswan, witnessed 14.9 percent rise to Rs 1.23 crore. Of the 14 ministers, whose wealth data for 2016-17 is available, finance minister Arun Jatiley is the wealthiest with net assets worth Rs 67.7 crore. Adding up his wife Sangita Jaitley’s wealth, the net asset surged to Rs 100.97 crore. On individual basis, Birender Singh comes in at a distant second with Rs 9.85 crore. However, on a combined basis, the Swarajs ranked second with net assets of Rs 28.41 crore. The data shows five ministers have net assets lower than their spouses. They are Sushma Swaraj, Prakash Javadekar, Ram Vilas Paswan, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Chaudhary Birender Singh. Details of 14 ministers’ wealth over the last three years: