By Prasun Sonwalkar, IANS
London : Britain's new Prime Minister Gordon Brown has appointed Shriti Vadera, an Indian-origin economist, as junior international development minister that will involve dealing with issues related to India.
She is the first Asian to be made a minister since Keith Vaz, who was minister for Europe from 1999-2001. Vadera's appointment as a junior minister is all the more significant since she is from outside the political spectrum.
Vadera, who was a central figure in the Treasury presided over by Brown, was tipped for a key role in 10, Downing Street, due to her proximity with Brown. She has advised him on various international issues, including Africa.
Born in Uganda, her family moved in the 1970s first to India and then to England, where she studied politics, philosophy and economics at Somerville College, Oxford. She has held key financial and economic positions in London's financial district.
Vadera is seen as a key behind-the-scenes figure who has the full confidence of Brown. She has been the main point of contact between the Treasury and the City, London's financial district.
The 40-something Vadera has been described in the corridors of Whitehall as "Gordon's representative on earth" and is known as a forceful official who often takes a higher profile in meetings than ministers due to her expertise and political common sense.
Vadera has overseen many of the more technical aspects of Treasury policy. She managed the sale of government defense-research company Qinetiq, the partial sale of the London Underground and arranged a bond sale to raise money to vaccinate poor children in Africa.
She is on the board of trustees of Oxfam. Former minister Stephen Byers once said of her: "Shriti's Shriti. She can be forceful and sometimes she can be a real sweetie. She's a significant player in Whitehall."
Martin Vander Weyer, a former speech writer of Vadera, wrote in The Spectator: "The serious-minded but likeable thirty-something I knew has transmuted into the assassin of Railtrack, the ass-kicker of Transport for London, the axe-wielder from the Treasury whom departmental ministers fear as acutely as they fear Gordon himself, with whose total authority she speaks.
"The frisson at the mention of her name – and the urge to be nasty about her, neither 'portly' nor 'middle-aged' being strictly accurate at that time are typical of Vadera's treatment by the media, a situation which Westminster reporters say has arisen because, unlike pretty well everyone else in that vicinity, she flatly refuses to talk to them.
"The Treasury offers no personal details about her, and she is so rarely photographed that some Westminster hacks still can't pick her out at parties.
"It was her willingness to drive private-sector solutions to achieve socialist objectives – plus her tenacity and technical competence – that recommended Vadera to Brown. She became his chief negotiator with the City and the business community, some of whom resented her manner."
Vadera is part of a brains trust that Brown has assiduously built over the past decade. Many members of this fiercely loyal team were picked before they turned 30. Besides Vadera, other members of the team include Ed Balls, Ed Miliband and Damian MacBride.