Cabinet reshuffle: With Nirmala Sitharaman as new defence minister, central security committee to have two women

New Delhi: With the appointment of Nirmala Sitharaman as the new defence minister on Sunday, the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS), will now have two women ministers.

External affairs minister Sushma Swaraj is member of the CCS, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, which is responsible for decisions on external and internal security. Its other members are finance minister Arun Jaitley and home minister Rajnath Singh.

Sitharaman was on Sunday elevated as cabinet minister in the reshuffle and expansion of the council of ministers and given the defence portfolio.

She is the first full-time woman defence minister of the country after late prime minister Indira Gandhi had twice held charge of defence portfolio - from 1-21 December, 1975 and 14 January, 1980 to 15 January, 1982.